What is the Approving Authority?

• A. Office or designated person authorized to approve submittal
• B. The Design Engineer
• C. The Owner
• D. The GC's Quality Manager

Answer: (A)

The key idea here is who has the formal permission to approve submittals. The Approving Authority is the office or designated person empowered by the contract to review a submittal (like shop drawings, product data, or samples) and issue approval or rejection. This role is defined in the contract documents and represents the authority to confirm that what will be used or installed meets the project requirements, codes, and design intent before work proceeds.

Sometimes the Design Engineer may be named as the Approving Authority, but not automatically. The crucial point is that the approval power rests with the person or office specifically authorized by the contract, not simply with the owner or the general contractor’s quality manager, who handles QA/QC tasks but does not inherently hold approval authority over submittals.