| dc.description.abstract | Regarding to the life cycle of mechanical and electrical engineering (MEE) works for building construction projects, if a contractor can accurately plan its overall budget in the contracting stage, and effectively monitor and control the budget in the construction and acceptance stages, it is possible to maintain its profits stably and further to ensure project’s quality. By doing so, the contractor can increase its reliability from the client and strengthen its brand image. Lacking of research on the budget management issues of MEE projects, this results in that the causes of budget changes in MEE works for building construction projects are unclear. Therefore, to improve the level of budget change controls is difficult. Focusing on the scope of MEE works for building construction projects, this research collects related literature and analyzes a real case to identify the causes of budget changes based on the structure and items in bill of quantity for MEE works. After analyzing the causes and impacts of buget changes in contracting and construction stages, this study idenfies that “low price bidding,” “inaccurate cost estimate or budget reallocating,” “quantity variation between original design and in practice,” “inappropriate subcontracting plan” and “budgeting omission” in the internal dimension and “owner’s change,”, “unclear original design,” “exclusive design specification,” “insufficient design space for piping and equipment in MEE works” and “recontracting for other subcontractor after subcontractor’s default” or “inability of subcontractor” in the external dimension are the key causes. For those causes, this research also provides related countermeasures and suggestions for improvement. It is anticipated that the research outcomes are valuable for managing budgets in MEE works, and improve the management level of budget controls. | en_US |