Anyone who commissions planning and construction services with investment costs running into the millions is taking an economic risk.

The planner or the building contractor could turn out to be incompetent and cause major damage; or he could even become insolvent and no longer provide his services at all. Because of these risks, provisions on so-called security deposits can be found in practically every construction contract and increasingly also in architects' contracts. These are contractual instruments with which the client in particular wants to create a safeguard for himself in the event that the contractor does not perform his services properly. The most common forms are the so-called security retention and guarantees.

As a landscape architect, you have to deal with this at various points in the project process; especially in phases 6 to 9, when it comes to construction contracts, construction execution and their billing. Here you can make a lot of mistakes. But also for the own architect contracts such security performances play an increasing role.