A realistic 8-week new-pool timeline for Berwick - and the payment schedule that goes with it.

Most Berwick pool conversations skip the most important step. Someone gets a glossy brochure quote at $58,000 for an 8m × 4m concrete shell, signs a contract, and then three weeks later finds out the block is Class H1 reactive clay and the pier schedule has just added $9,400 to the build. That is not a sales tactic - that is the industry routinely under-quoting because the soil information was not on the table at the time the price was set.

We do it the other way around. Before any number goes in writing, we book a geotechnical engineer to drill two test holes on your block, take samples at 1.0m, 1.8m and 2.4m, and return an AS 2870 site classification. Most of the City of Casey comes back Class H or H1 - highly to extremely reactive clay. A small number of higher blocks around Beaconsfield Upper come back Class M (moderately reactive), which actually saves money. Whatever you have got, we quote the real engineering for your specific block, not a generic price.

The soil test costs us $380 and takes 5 working days. We carry that cost - you only pay if you sign the build contract. It is the single best $400 we spend on every job because it eliminates the most common cause of variations during construction.

The week-by-week schedule.

This is for the build phase - after contract sign and permit issue. Permit timelines add 4-6 weeks at the front of the program (planning permit only required for some overlay zones; building permit is universal). We start the on-site clock when the excavator arrives.

• Week 1 - Excavation and piers. 5-8 trucks of clay haul out depending on shell size. Bored piers drilled to 1.5-2.4m below the active soil zone, depending on the AS 2870 classification. Pier cages dropped, concrete poured, 24-hour cure.
• Week 2 - Steel and plumbing. Full reinforcing cage tied to pier starter bars at 200mm centres. Suction and return plumbing roughed in. Bonding earth strap installed. Engineer inspects before shotcrete.
• Week 3 - Shotcrete shell. Wet-mix shotcrete sprayed at 200-250mm thickness. One day on site for a standard 8 × 4m. Daily wet-down begins immediately.
• Weeks 4-6 - The 28-day cure. Non-negotiable. Concrete reaches design strength at 28 days. We use this time to install fence footings, run the equipment-pad slab, and start the paving prep so we are not idle.
• Week 7 - Interior finish and coping. Pebble, quartz or tile applied to the shell. Bullnose tile or travertine coping set on top. Waterline tile band installed. 48-hour cure on the finish.
• Week 8 - Equipment, fence, fill and handover. Pump, filter, salt chlorinator, heater (if specified), and automation commissioned. AS 1926 pool fence inspected and certified. Pool filled. Water balanced. Handover walkthrough and warranty documents.

That is an 8-week clean run. In the real world, two to four weeks of weather buffer gets baked in depending on the season. Winter digs (June-August) are slowest because a 30mm rainfall closes the hole for a week. Autumn digs (March-May) are the fastest because Casey clay is at its driest and most stable.

The 5-stage progress payment schedule.

Domestic Building Contracts Act 1995 (Victoria) caps deposits at 10% and requires progress payments tied to defined stages. Here is how our standard schedule maps to the build.

1. Stage 1 - Deposit (10%) on contract sign. Covers design fee, engineering report, permit lodgement and the materials deposit on long-lead items (premium tile imports, custom-sized shells, automation hardware).
2. Stage 2 - Excavation complete (25%). Hole dug to design depth, piers bored and poured, soil haul invoiced. This is the highest variable-cost week of the job and the supplier payments fall here.
3. Stage 3 - Shell complete (30%). Shotcrete sprayed, cured for 28 days, and pressure tested. By this point you have a structurally complete pool - just no finish, no coping, no equipment.
4. Stage 4 - Interior and coping complete (25%). Pebble/tile/quartz in. Coping set. Waterline tile installed. Equipment pad ready for fit-off.
5. Stage 5 - Practical completion (10%). Fence certified to AS 1926, equipment commissioned, water balanced, handover walkthrough done, warranty documents and pool-fence Form 23 issued.

No payment is requested in advance of work done. Every stage claim is invoiced after you can see the milestone on site - we encourage you to walk through with us before you transfer. The 10% final-stage retention is your leverage to make sure the handover items get finished properly.

Where the rain-day buffer sits.

We do not pad every stage equally. The buffer sits where the risk sits: the excavation and pier weeks. A wet autumn or a wet winter can add 2-10 days to that single phase. After the shell is sprayed and cured, weather barely matters - interior finish, coping and equipment all happen with the pool empty under a tarp or behind a fence, and rain does not stop them. So a “16-week build” in our paperwork is really “8 weeks of work plus 4-6 weeks of permit lead-time plus 2-4 weeks of weather buffer” - and the weather buffer collapses to zero if we time the dig to autumn.

What we tell clients to lock in early.

• Interior finish. 6-8 week lead time on premium quartz blends and imported glass-bead pebble. Decide at contract sign.
• Coping. Travertine and bluestone need to be ordered before the shell goes in.
• Fence type. Glass-panel pool fences are a 4-week fabrication lead. Aluminium tubular is in stock locally.
• Heater. Heat-pump pool heaters were on 12-week back-order through 2025. Order at contract sign or you will hold up Stage 5.

Get those four decisions made in the first fortnight and your 8-week build clock runs cleanly. Leave them to “we’ll decide when we’re closer” and the build pauses while you are choosing tile samples.