Research carried out among members of the Building & Engineering Services Association (B&ES) has revealed that market conditions continued to improve in the second half of 2013.
More firms acknowledged an increase in orders and enquiries compared with six months ago, while half reported a rise in their turnover levels. Member optimism regarding future prospects was also seen to have consolidated - while the number of firms recruiting apprentices and trainees rose modestly but significantly during the period.

There were indications that the recovering commercial environment meant that margins had ceased to fall - although increases in labour and materials costs were becoming a cause for concern for 33% and 63% of respondents respectively.

In addition, the research revealed that levels of both direct employment and the use of agency labour had risen - the former for the first time in the lifetime of the survey - and that these trends were likely to continue during the next six-month period.

Only in the domestic heating sub-sector were market conditions reported to have worsened, with a decline indicated in both order books and enquiries.

B&ES chief executive Roderick Pettigrew pointed out that this was the second successive B&ES survey to have painted a relatively bright picture of prospects across building engineering services and, by implication, the construction industry as a whole.

He said: 'Encouragingly, our findings appear to be in line with those of other surveys carried out recently in adjacent sectors, which taken together provide evidence of a sustained, if still modest, process of recovery.'

Although issues surrounding late payment and poor margins continued to have an adverse effect on some businesses, Mr Pettigrew said it is significant that members were becoming less concerned about client and main contractor insolvency.

He added that the collection of market statistics was of key importance to industry as it enabled individual firms to benchmark their performance against the sector as a whole - and that the findings of the B&ES survey would be used by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) in respect of its own pan-industry research.

The fourth B&ES survey, covering the period from July to December 2013, was undertaken in January by independent consultant Lychgate Projects. A full report on its findings can be found on the B&ES website at www.b-es.org.

The fifth B&ES state of trade survey - covering the period from January to June 2014 - will be conducted online in July.