MS General Contractor common mistakes
MS General Contractor · Understand the traps and how to avoid them.
Treating the contractor license as a credential that belongs to the owner personally, and answering that nothing needs to be filed with the board when the sole proprietor incorporates, renames the company, or replaces the qualifier.
Prep material emphasizes 'get licensed before you contract' but rarely drills the lifecycle events, so candidates default to the intuition that the license follows the person who passed the exam.
What to do instead
Build a one-page license-lifecycle card with a row for each event - new entity, trade name change, ownership change, qualifier departure, additional qualifier, expiration/renewal - and for each row write who must notify the board, what form or fee applies, and whether the entity can keep contracting in the interim. Recite it until each row is automatic.
Bidding or contracting on public work without first confirming that the firm's license classification and monetary limit cover the project and that the required certificate of responsibility is in place, then answering licensing questions from the dollar amount alone.
Candidates memorize 'you need a license' and one threshold number, but the exam tests the interaction between classification (commercial, residential, specialty), the bid/contract limit, and the separate public-work certificate requirement.
What to do instead
Make a two-column table: column one, private work; column two, public work. Under each, list what document the firm must hold, which classification applies, what the monetary limit attaches to (bid, contract, or both), and what happens if the qualifier leaves. Answer every licensing item by first asking 'public or private?' and 'which classification?'
Memorizing one 'lien deadline' and applying it to every claimant and every project type, so the preliminary notice date, the lien filing date, and the deadline to sue to enforce are collapsed into a single number.
Lien statutes contain several separate clocks that start from different events, and they shift depending on whether the claimant contracted directly with the owner and whether the project is residential or commercial. A single flashcard number feels sufficient.
What to do instead
Draw a horizontal timeline with three markers per claimant type: notice to owner or to the prime, recording of the lien, and suit to enforce. Make one version for a direct contractor and one for a sub or supplier, and note the residential/commercial difference. For each practice question, identify the claimant type first, then read the date off the correct marker.
Eyeballing a network diagram and naming the path with the most activities, the biggest dollar value, or the heaviest resource load as the critical path, then treating an activity that carries total float as though any slip in it delays completion.
Forward-pass and backward-pass arithmetic is slow under time pressure, so candidates substitute visual weight for computation - and the busiest-looking path is often not the longest-duration path.
What to do instead
For every network item, do the arithmetic on scratch paper: forward pass for early start/finish, backward pass for late start/finish, then list total float per activity. Reframe question stems: 'will this delay the project?' is a total-float question, and 'cheapest way to shorten the job' is a crash question answered only on zero-float activities using cost per day saved.
Deciding whether the contractor deserves extra time or extra money based on how severe or unfair the delaying event felt, rather than on which party owns the risk under the contract, and ignoring concurrent delay language.
Weather, owner-directed changes, and a failed subcontractor all read as events the contractor 'couldn't control,' so candidates grant time and money to all three instead of sorting them.
What to do instead
Sort every delay scenario into three buckets before reading the answer choices: owner-caused (time and money), excusable but no-fault such as weather or force majeure (time only), and contractor-caused (neither). Then check the contract's concurrency and notice provisions, since a late notice can forfeit even a valid claim.
Adding a flat percentage to cost and calling it margin, and submitting a bid that omits waste factors, sales tax, permit fees, bond premium, and general conditions because the extended quantities looked complete.
Markup is applied to cost while margin is a percentage of price, and the two diverge quickly at real percentages; separately, a clean quantity takeoff creates a false sense of completeness.
What to do instead
Practice the conversion both ways - margin = markup ÷ (1 + markup), markup = margin ÷ (1 − margin) - until you can do it in your head at 10%, 15%, and 20%. Keep a standing bid checklist: waste factor per material, tax, permits, bond, insurance, overhead, contingency, and general conditions. Answer every margin question by restating it as 'percent of what?'
Scaling a dimension off the drawing or answering a clearance, code, or material question from the plan sheet without consulting the specifications, general notes, and schedule sheets.
The drawing answers the visual question fastest, and specifications read like boilerplate - but exam items are usually built to turn on a written requirement or a noted dimension.
What to do instead
Never scale a drawing in an answer; figures govern over scaled dimensions, and specific provisions govern over general notes. Before answering, name the document that controls (drawing, specification section, general conditions, addendum) and apply the contract's order-of-precedence clause. If the stem gives both a written dimension and a scaled one, the written one wins.
Treating 'competent person' and 'qualified person' as synonyms, and carrying general-industry thresholds into construction scenarios such as fall protection, ladders, and housekeeping.
Both sets are simply called 'OSHA standards' in study apps, and the two role titles sound interchangeable; the construction part (1926) and general industry part (1910) have different triggers that are easy to swap.
What to do instead
Tag every standard with its part number: 1926 governs construction, 1910 governs general industry. Write the two definitions in your own words - a competent person identifies hazards and is authorized to take prompt corrective action; a qualified person has recognized degree or experience and can design and approve. Then answer as the controlling employer on a multi-employer site, not as a bystander.
Computing working capital, current ratio, and quick ratio from whatever balance-sheet lines look current, and treating revenue recognized under percentage of completion as cash actually collected.
The formulas look trivial, so candidates work from memory and skip the definitions - then inventory, retainage receivable, and the current portion of long-term debt get placed on the wrong side of the line.
What to do instead
Write the three formulas with exact line items: working capital = current assets − current liabilities; current ratio = current assets ÷ current liabilities; quick ratio = (cash + marketable securities + receivables) ÷ current liabilities. Practice on a sample balance sheet that includes retainage receivable and a current portion of long-term debt, and state in words that recognized revenue is not collected cash.
Answering labor and environmental items from the general rule of thumb - treating crew members paid on 1099 as independent subcontractors without a classification test, and assuming erosion and sediment controls are a site-plan formality rather than a permit trigger.
Both areas sit at the edge of day-to-day field practice, so candidates rely on 'everybody does it this way' instead of the control test and the permit threshold.
What to do instead
Memorize the classification factors as a checklist (control, direction, tools, opportunity for profit, duration) and remember that holding the license does not convert an employee into a sub. For environmental, attach the permit to the trigger: disturbance above the acreage threshold pulls in stormwater permitting and a site-specific pollution prevention plan, with inspection and recordkeeping duties that belong to the operator on site. Answer by naming the trigger first.