Exemption from liability for heavy construction machinery

Which prefabricated house provider is this? Feel free to send a private message, as we are also considering getting a prefabricated house.

Update: After initially finding it difficult to obtain alternative offers in the limited supplier market for such large cranes (they are all interconnected), we have actually found a crane company in Bornheim that a) operates NATIONWIDE and has several locations as well as its own mobile cranes up to 500 tons, and b) was willing to submit an offer to us without fear of losing contracts from prefabricated house manufacturers.

Moreover, this company proved to be an absolute stroke of luck because:

a) Extremely customer-oriented and flexible sales, also easily reachable and reliable regarding callbacks and responses

b) Complete liability assumption by the crane rental company (in contrast to the crane company of the prefabricated house provider)

c) Risk assumption in case of bad weather up to one day cancellation before the appointment (in the other terms and conditions, the crane would have had to be fully paid for by then)

d) About 2,500 EUR cheaper than the offer from the prefabricated house company with the same offer content and services

And you might not believe it, the dispatcher even made a proposal on his OWN initiative on how to

a) avoid that due to the full road closure about 10 driveways and garages of the neighbors cannot be accessed for three days (that was the plan of the crane rental company of the prefabricated house company). Now everyone can drive onto their property, into their driveway or garage despite the full road closure, which is extremely beneficial for neighborhood peace;

b) save an entire crane day for the large crane and thus immense costs (beyond the savings of the aforementioned 2,500 EUR);

So to be clear once again: They are so honest and accommodating that they themselves suggest alternatives for a time- and cost-minimal deployment of their cranes. *Pinch me* ... Unbelievable, right?

So far: Great service, easily reachable sales and field staff, all previous appointments with authorities, etc. have been kept and permits obtained despite tight scheduling. We have received many tips and the people there think along and help wherever they can. In 2018, after 10 years of construction boom in Germany, actually unimaginable....

Can you just switch the crane provider like that?

I would absolutely not agree to a release of liability either. If necessary, I would also offer a mutual termination of the contract. How audacious it is simply to shift the risk.

can you just switch crane providers like that?

If the alternative A is: personal liability for sidewalks, streets, and neighboring buildings from the crane work of a third party (who then gets a clean slate) and
alternative B: crane company is liable itself for its deployment and is besides that 3,000 EUR cheaper...

then I would also have left it up to a legal dispute. I am not a lawyer, but I can hardly imagine that a company can force me to bear both a more expensive provider and especially the personal liability for the consequences of its deployment.

Fortunately, we were able to reach an agreement with our in-house company quite quickly. Probably also because, after a long history of suffering with them, we are already conflict-tested and slowly both sides are no longer interested in these constant disputes.

But for everyone else: The prefabricated house provider said they always do it like that with liability and for the other builders it’s not a problem... Well then.... maybe they just don’t read everything that’s in the footnote :)

To conclude this thread: All's well that ends well. It worked out great, our self-arranged crane company did an excellent job and even finished a day earlier than planned. Everyone is satisfied, the construction company, the neighbors because the inconvenience caused by the cranes was reduced to a minimum, and of course the builders because they had to pay less than planned and were released from liability. TOP, we would wish for many more such service providers on the construction site.