The Saudi Engineers Authority organized two workshops titled "Challenges of Engineering Offices and Companies" in the capital Riyadh and Jeddah, with the participation of several engineers and owners of engineering and consulting offices and companies. The workshops aimed to develop the authority's operations and initiate several projects that would enhance the quality of outputs and positively impact operational and regulatory processes and services for the primary and affiliate members.
In his speech, Engineer Abdul Mohsen Al-Majnouni, Secretary General of the Authority, stated that these workshops reflect the authority's awareness of its main role and its commitment to working diligently to overcome challenges and enhance the contribution of engineering offices and companies to major national projects. He noted that the authority had studied and reviewed the challenges facing the engineering sector that could be addressed in the short and long term. He added that the authority had previously conducted several workshops with engineers and owners of engineering offices and companies in Riyadh, Khobar, and Jeddah to gather the key challenges facing these offices and companies. These challenges were subsequently classified into legislative challenges, financial challenges, and the outputs of engineering facilities. The authority studied and reviewed these challenges, which went through four phases of addressing engineering sector challenges: the phase of identifying challenges, irregular practices, reviewing and identifying relevant parties, collaboration and proposing suitable solutions, and the phase of processing and measuring the impact.
The Secretary General revealed challenges related to irregular practices in engineering offices and companies, including the most prominent issue of commercial concealment in these offices and companies, the use of advertising and marketing means without holding a valid practice license from certain institutions and companies, a clear disparity in service prices among engineering offices and companies, and advertising engineering service prices. Other issues included reliance on engineering plans issued by specialized offices without verifying the activities listed in the license, the lack of organization to determine the number of branches for engineering offices based on their capabilities and personnel, quality control over engineering plans for issuing building permits, allowing others to use the engineering office or company license, dealing with individuals outside the Kingdom for engineering designs, employing professionals on unauthorized visit visas, the absence of actual Saudi managers in the branches of engineering offices, having professional personnel not sponsored by the office in occupations different from actual work, and the existence of institutions and contracting companies offering engineering services without a license. He emphasized that the authority seeks to activate its role in collaboration with relevant parties to find appropriate solutions for all challenges facing the sector.
The Secretary General of the authority also disclosed the timeline for projects of the Saudi Engineers Authority, which includes the newly created "Internal Projects Portfolio." This includes updating the authority's requirements for engineering offices and companies, updating and activating the Engineers Charter and enhancing professional ethics, establishing a mechanism to confront fake offices and irregular practices in the Saudi engineering labor market, increasing financial support sources for engineering offices and companies, creating a model for an engineering office or company as a standard to be followed in implementing requirements, developing the services of the "Mouhadel" platform, finding a mechanism to regulate invitations in government projects for engineering offices and companies, transferring expertise from large engineering offices and companies to medium and small ones, establishing a clear guideline for professional fees, and creating professional development programs for engineers.
