Every general contractor knows the frustration: a submittal comes back from the design team marked “revise and resubmit.” Another two weeks added to the timeline. Another round of coordination with subcontractors. Another delay rippling through the schedule.
But here’s what most contractors don’t realize: that single rejection just cost the project anywhere from $550 to over $8,500. Multiply that across the dozens or hundreds of submittals on a typical commercial project, and the industry-standard 30-40% rejection rate becomes one of the most expensive – yet most overlooked – line items in construction.
The math is sobering. On a project processing 500 submittals with a 35% rejection rate, the total cost of rejections alone can exceed $150,000. For larger projects with 2,000+ submittals, that number climbs into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Yet most construction companies still treat submittal rejections as an unavoidable cost of doing business. They shouldn’t.
The Hidden Price Tag of Submittal Rejections
Understanding the true cost of submittal rejections requires looking beyond the obvious. Yes, there’s the direct labor cost of the project engineer spending hours reworking the submittal package. But that’s just the beginning.
Timeline Delays Cascade
According to research compiled by Plan Academy, design changes and submittal issues account for significant schedule delays in 35-40% of construction projects. Each submittal rejection typically adds 2-3 weeks to the project timeline when accounting for resubmission, re-review, and approval cycles. For items on the critical path – mechanical equipment with 16-week lead times, structural steel, or curtain wall systems – these delays compound quickly.
A rejected rooftop unit submittal in month two doesn’t just delay that equipment. It pushes back ductwork coordination, electrical rough-in, ceiling installation, and ultimately, substantial completion. The two-week rejection cycle turns into a six-week project delay, affecting dozens of downstream trades.
Labor Costs Multiply
The project engineer spends an average of 4-6 hours reworking a rejected submittal. At a burdened labor rate of $85-110 per hour, that’s $340-660 in direct costs. But the real expense comes from the opportunity cost: those hours could have been spent on coordination, problem-solving, or managing field operations – activities that actually move the project forward.
For subcontractors, the impact is even more pronounced. Smaller mechanical or electrical contractors often have one or two people handling all submittal preparation. When submittals repeatedly bounce back, it takes key personnel away from estimating new work, managing installations, or developing their teams.
Relationships Deteriorate
Design teams remember which contractors consistently submit clean, compliant submittals – and which ones don’t. Architects and engineers reviewing 200+ submittals across multiple projects will prioritize the contractors who make their jobs easier. Poor documentation and communication quality consistently rank among the top sources of conflict between design teams and contractors in the industry.
Consistently high rejection rates damage these relationships in ways that are hard to quantify but easy to feel. Design teams become less responsive. They’re less likely to work collaboratively on value engineering. And when it comes time to bid on the next project, the contractor with a reputation for submittal problems starts at a disadvantage.
Material and Equipment Delays
When a submittal is rejected, the clock restarts on procurement. Manufacturers and suppliers work on lead times based on approved submittals. A rejection in week four means the 12-week lead time doesn’t start until week six – or later if multiple revision cycles are needed.
For long-lead items, this can be catastrophic. Chillers, transformers, elevators, and specialty glazing systems often have 16-24 week lead times even after approval. Add rejection delays on top of that, and projects can find themselves facing substantial completion penalties or extended general conditions costs that dwarf the original submittal review investment.
Why the 35% Rejection Rate Persists
If submittal rejections are so costly, why hasn’t the industry solved this problem? The answer lies in several interconnected challenges.
Project Engineers Are Overwhelmed
The typical PE on a $50M commercial project is managing 300-500 submittals while also coordinating RFIs, change orders, schedule updates, and field operations. According to Autodesk’s construction industry statistics, 52% of rework in construction is caused by poor project data and miscommunication, costing the U.S. construction industry $31.3 billion annually.
Submittal review falls into a particularly challenging category: it requires deep technical knowledge of specifications, careful attention to detail, and hours of focused time – exactly the resources that are scarcest on active projects. The result is that submittals often get reviewed quickly rather than thoroughly, or they sit in queues waiting for someone to have the bandwidth to review them properly.
Specifications Keep Getting More Complex
Twenty years ago, a typical mechanical specification for an air handler might have been 15-20 pages with 8-10 key requirements to verify. Today, that same specification is 60-80 pages with 30+ data points to check: efficiency ratings, sound levels, coil configurations, control sequences, seismic certifications, sustainability requirements, and manufacturer-specific callouts.
This complexity creates two problems. First, it takes longer to thoroughly review each submittal. Second, it increases the likelihood that something will be missed or misinterpreted, leading to rejections that could have been caught earlier.
Junior Engineers Lack Experience
Many construction companies assign submittal review to junior project engineers who are still learning the technical requirements of different building systems. While this provides valuable training, it also means the people doing the most detailed technical review often have the least experience.
A first-year PE reviewing an electrical submittal may not immediately recognize that the specified transformer is aluminum-wound rather than copper-wound, or that the switchgear includes the wrong interrupting rating. These are exactly the kinds of technical details that design teams will flag on resubmission.
Practical Strategies to Reduce Rejection Rates
The good news is that submittal rejection rates can be dramatically reduced with the right approach. Leading contractors are achieving 5-10% rejection rates – a complete reversal of the industry standard. Here’s how they’re doing it.
Implement Front-End Quality Checks
The most effective strategy is catching non-compliant submittals before they reach the design team. This requires a systematic review process where every submittal gets checked against specifications for technical compliance before submission.
Some contractors have dedicated quality control personnel who review all submittals before they go out. Others have senior project managers spot-check high-risk submittals (long-lead equipment, critical path items, technically complex systems). The key is having a consistent process that doesn’t rely on the judgment of a single junior engineer working under deadline pressure.
Standardize the Review Process
Create submittal review checklists for common equipment types. For mechanical submittals, this might include: efficiency ratings, sound levels, materials of construction, warranty requirements, seismic certification, and control compatibility. For electrical gear: voltage ratings, interrupting capacity, enclosure types, and short circuit ratings.
These checklists serve two purposes: they ensure consistent review quality regardless of who’s doing the work, and they provide training tools for junior engineers learning what to look for. Over time, the checklists can be refined based on common rejection reasons.
Leverage Technology Solutions
Construction technology has evolved significantly in the past few years, and submittal review is one area where new tools are making a real impact. AI-powered platforms like BuildSync can now extract technical data from submittal documents and automatically check them against project specifications, reducing the time required for manual review while catching discrepancies that might otherwise be missed.
These tools don’t replace the project engineer’s judgment – particularly on items requiring interpretation or coordination – but they eliminate much of the tedious data extraction and comparison work that traditionally consumed 70-80% of submittal review time.
Invest in PE Training
Many submittal rejections stem from knowledge gaps rather than carelessness. Project engineers who understand mechanical systems, electrical distribution, and building envelope assemblies will catch problems that others miss.
Smart contractors invest in technical training for their engineering teams: lunch-and-learns with equipment manufacturers, specification workshops, and site visits to see how systems go together. This pays dividends not just in submittal review but across all aspects of project execution.
Build Better Subcontractor Relationships
Some rejection cycles can be eliminated through better communication with subcontractors. Rather than waiting for a submittal package to arrive and then finding problems, proactive project teams engage with subs early: reviewing equipment selections at buyout, discussing specification requirements during pre-construction, and catching issues before formal submittals are prepared.
This is particularly effective with MEP subcontractors who often have legitimate questions about specification intent or potential alternatives. Addressing these questions early – through RFIs or design team conversations – prevents submittals from being prepared and rejected based on misunderstandings.
The ROI of Getting It Right
Reducing submittal rejection rates from 35% to 5% delivers measurable returns that go straight to the bottom line. On a 500-submittal project, that’s 150 fewer rejection cycles – saving 30-45 days of schedule time and $82,500 to $150,000 in direct and indirect costs.
But the returns extend beyond individual projects. Contractors known for submittal quality get faster design team turnaround times, better collaboration on value engineering, and stronger reputations that lead to repeat work and negotiated contracts.
The submittal process will never be anyone’s favorite part of construction. But it doesn’t have to be the expensive, frustrating bottleneck it’s become for so many projects. With the right processes, tools, and mindset, the industry-standard 35% rejection rate is entirely preventable.
The question isn’t whether reducing rejection rates is worth the investment. The question is whether contractors can afford not to.