Construction Claim Rules in Maine

Statutory interest rate

Floating, 1-yr T-bill + 3% (pre-judgment, no contract rate); 1-yr T-bill + 6% or contract rate, whichever is greater (post-judgment)

Where a contract or note specifies its own interest rate, that rate governs prejudgment interest. Otherwise, prejudgment interest is the one-year U.S. Treasury bill rate plus 3%, running from the date a sworn notice of claim was served until judgment. Postjudgment interest is the one-year T-bill rate plus 6% (or the contract rate, if higher), running from judgment entry through any appeal, set annually from the Treasury yield for the last full week of the prior calendar year.

Compounding: Not specified on the face of the statute; treated as simple interest in Maine practice.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 1602-B (pre-judgment); 14 M.R.S. § 1602-C (post-judgment)

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/14/title14sec1602-B.html

Last checked: 2026-08-25

Both rates are set from the one-year Treasury yield for the last full week of the prior calendar year, so pull the current figure rather than using a stored number. At the last check, in August 2026, the formula gave roughly 6.9% prejudgment and 9.9% postjudgment, or the contract rate if higher.

Accrual: breach of contract claim

From when a sworn notice of claim was served, or from filing if no notice was given; not date of breach itself

14 M.R.S. § 1602-B accrues prejudgment interest from the time a notice of claim, setting forth the cause of action under oath, is served personally or by registered/certified mail on the defendant. If no such notice was given, interest instead accrues from the date the complaint was filed. Neither trigger is automatically the date of breach; sending a proper notice promptly is what starts the clock.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 1602-B

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/14/title14sec1602-B.html

Sending a sworn notice of claim early, rather than waiting to file suit, can meaningfully increase the interest that ultimately accrues; confirm the notice's required form (sworn, served personally or by registered/certified mail) before relying on this earlier date.

Accrual: property damage / tort claim

Same notice-or-filing rule as contract claims; only the interest rate differs by claim type

The same statute, 14 M.R.S. § 1602-B, governs property-damage and other non-contract claims, using the identical accrual trigger (notice of claim served, or complaint filing if no notice was given). The interest rate differs, contract/note claims use the contract's own rate while other claims use the one-year Treasury bill rate plus 3%, but the accrual date mechanism is the same.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 1602-B

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/14/title14sec1602-B.html

Actual Cash Value rule

Replacement cost minus physical depreciation (statutory formula since 1989)

Defined directly by statute: replacement cost of the insured item at time of loss, less physical depreciation determined according to standard business practices. This 1989 statute superseded an earlier Maine Supreme Judicial Court common-law test that had defined ACV as fair market value (a willing-buyer/willing-seller standard); the statute is later in time, more specific and enacted directly within the Insurance Code, so it controls going forward, though the older case may still carry some interpretive weight where the statute doesn't reach.

Citation: 24-A M.R.S. § 3004-A (statute, controlling); Gendron v. Pawtucket Mut. Ins. Co., 384 A.2d 694 (Me. 1978) (superseded common-law test)

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/24-a/title24-Asec3004-A.html

Gendron predates the statute and applies a different test. No later Maine decision says in so many words that the statute supersedes it, so that conclusion rests on the statute being later in time and more specific.

ACV statute or regulation

Maine has a statute defining actual cash value as replacement cost minus physical depreciation, but it does not address labor depreciation specifically.

24-A M.R.S. section 3004-A defines 'actual cash value,' as used in the state's standard fire policy provisions at section 3002, to mean the replacement cost of an insured item of property at the time of loss, less the value of physical depreciation as to the item damaged, with physical depreciation determined according to standard business practices. The statute does not state whether labor cost may or may not be depreciated as part of that calculation.

Citation: 24-A M.R.S. section 3004-A

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/24-a/title24-Asec3004-A.html

No Maine decision or Bureau of Insurance rule addresses labor depreciation.

Recoverable depreciation holdback

No Maine statute or regulation sets the timing of a recoverable depreciation holdback or addresses labor depreciation, so the policy terms control.

Title 24-A, including the unfair claims practices provisions at § 2164-D, covers general claims handling conduct and Maine defines ACV by statute as replacement cost less physical depreciation. Neither sets a deadline or procedure for releasing withheld depreciation once repairs are complete and neither addresses labor.

Citation: Me. Rev. Stat. tit. 24-A, § 2164-D.

Source: https://uphelp.org/claim-guidance-publications/insurance-consumer-rights-in-maine-2022/

“No damages for delay” clause enforceability

Enforceable: a clause limiting the contractor's remedy for delay to a time extension has been upheld

A federal court applying Maine law held that a contract clause limiting a contractor's remedy for project delays to an extension of time, rather than money damages, is enforceable. It appears to be the only reported decision on the question under Maine law.

Citation: Yonkers Contracting Co. v. Maine Turnpike Auth., 208 F. Supp. 517, 521 (D. Me. 1962)

Source: https://www.woodsaitken.com/sites/default/files/Survey_50-State-Matrix_Pay-If-Paid_No-Damage-for-Delay.pdf

The Yonkers litigation against the Maine Turnpike Authority produced more than one reported decision, including a 1958 ruling that denied summary judgment on delay claims over borrow pits. Check the year and reporter page when citing it.

Construction contract filing deadline

6 years for a civil action generally, including an ordinary contract claim

Maine's general limitations period for civil actions, including an action on a contract, is 6 years from when the cause of action accrues, unless a different period is otherwise specially provided. Two deadlines sit in front of that one on most construction claims. A mechanic's lien and a payment bond claim each run on their own, far shorter clock, counted from last furnishing rather than from breach and missing either one removes the security while leaving the contract claim alive but unsecured. Check those dates first. Accrual is the other half of the question: the period runs from breach, which on a payment dispute is usually the date payment came due rather than the date the work was done.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 752

Source: https://law.justia.com/codes/maine/title-14/part-2/chapter-205/subchapter-1/section-752/

Statute of repose: Maine has none for builders

Only licensed architects and engineers get an outer bar and even that one can be contracted away, so a contractor has no repose defense at all

Maine's sole construction-adjacent repose provision reaches architects and engineers licensed or registered under Title 32. A malpractice or professional-negligence action against them must be commenced within 4 years after the malpractice or negligence is discovered and in no event more than 10 years after substantial completion of the construction contract, or of the services where no construction contract is involved. Unusually, the section provides that its limitation periods do not apply where the parties have entered into a valid contract setting different ones, so the design professional's outer bar is itself contractual and can be lengthened or shortened by agreement.

There is no comparable statute of repose available to builders and the discovery rule that § 752-A gives design professionals does not extend to parties who are not design professionals. A contractor sued in Maine has the general 6-year limitations period and nothing behind it.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 752-A

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/14/title14sec752-A.html

The contracting-out sentence in § 752-A is worth noticing at the negotiation stage rather than at the claim stage. A design agreement that is silent leaves the statutory 4-and-10 structure in place; one that sets its own periods displaces it in either direction.

Accrual: no discovery rule on the 6-year period

The clock runs from when the wrongful act produced injury, not from when the defect was found and difficulty of discovery does not extend it

Maine's 6-year period under 14 M.R.S. § 752 runs from accrual and with narrow exceptions Maine does not apply a discovery rule. In a construction-defect claim pleaded in contract, negligence or warranty, the cause of action accrues when the breach occurred, ordinarily when the contractor performed the work called for by the contract. Maine's Law Court has held the period began running at completion of a construction contract even though the defect was difficult to discover. Where the claimant had no contractual relationship with the contractor, as in a personal-injury claim by a third party, accrual is the date of injury instead, so the 6 years can begin long after the work ended.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 752; Dunelawn Owners' Ass'n v. Gendreau, 750 A.2d 591 (Me. 2000)

Source: https://law.justia.com/codes/maine/title-14/part-2/chapter-205/subchapter-1/section-752/

Dunelawn is cited here from practitioner compendia rather than a direct read of the opinion. Taken with the entry above, Maine is an outlier in both directions: hard on an owner who finds a defect late, because nothing tolls the period for difficulty of discovery and exposed for a contractor facing a late-accruing injury claim, because no repose period closes the window.

Prompt Payment Act penalty: 1% per month, as a penalty

Awarded on top of all other damages, not instead of them, plus attorney's fees to the substantially prevailing party

Where arbitration or litigation is commenced to recover payment due under Chapter 201-A and the arbitrator or court determines that an owner, contractor or subcontractor failed to comply with the chapter's payment terms, the statute directs an award equal to 1% per month of all sums for which payment has wrongfully been withheld, in addition to all other damages due and as a penalty. Attorney's fees go to the substantially prevailing party. The chapter preserves good-faith withholding: nothing in it prevents withholding an amount equalling the value of good-faith claims against the invoicing party, including claims arising from unsatisfactory job progress, defective construction or materials, disputed work, or third-party claims.

Absent contract payment terms, an owner pays the contractor within 20 days after the later of the end of the billing period or delivery of the invoice and each tier pays down within 7 days of receiving payment or a payment request, whichever is later.

Citation: 10 M.R.S. §§ 1113, 1114, 1118(1), 1118(2), 1118(4)

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/10/title10sec1118.html

This is 12% a year sitting on top of the statutory interest shown higher on this page and because the statute calls it a penalty rather than interest it is additive rather than a substitute. A Maine interest calculation that omits it understates the claim. Note also the proof burden: showing that the work was completed and a balance is outstanding is not by itself enough to trigger the penalty; the claimant must show non-compliance with the chapter's payment terms, a point Maine's Law Court made in Jenkins, Inc. v. Walsh Bros., 2001 ME 98.

Retainage: timing is statutory, the percentage is not

Released within 30 days of final acceptance and passed down within 7 days of receipt regardless of what your subcontract says; no statutory percentage ceiling applies to private work

Where payments under a construction contract are subject to retainage, amounts retained during performance and due to be released on completion must be paid within 30 days after final acceptance of the work. A contractor or subcontractor must then pay its own subcontractors and suppliers their share within 7 days after receiving retainage and this duty applies regardless of any contrary agreement. Failure exposes the withholding party to the interest, penalty and attorney's fee provisions of the chapter.

On the percentage, sources diverge. Some contract templates and summaries state that 5% is Maine's statutory ceiling for private projects. Section 1116 as published by the Legislature addresses the timing and downstream flow of retainage and does not set a percentage and no separate Maine statute caps private retainage.

Citation: 10 M.R.S. § 1116

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/10/title10sec1116.pdf

Treat a 5% figure for Maine private work as a contract norm rather than a statutory ceiling until you locate the section that imposes it. The practical consequence runs the other way from what most people expect: because the statute governs timing rather than amount, a contractor who pays its subs strictly under its subcontract can still violate the Act, since the 7-day flow-down overrides the subcontract's schedule.

Mechanic's lien: 90 days to record, 120 days to sue, both from last work

The enforcement window closes roughly 30 days after the recording deadline, not 120 days after it

A subcontractor or supplier preserves the lien by recording a sworn statement of the amount due, a description of the property and the names of the owners in the registry of deeds for the county where the property lies, within 90 days after ceasing to labor or furnish materials or services and mailing a copy to the owner. A general contractor in privity with the owner records nothing and preserves its rights through the enforcement action instead.

The action to enforce must be filed against the debtor, the owner and other interested parties within 120 days after the last of the labor, materials or services were furnished. Because both clocks start on the same date, the enforcement window is not 120 days after recording. It is about 30 days after the 90-day recording deadline. A notice of the lien complaint is then recorded in the registry of deeds to protect priority against bona fide purchasers. On residential property, a claimant who did not contract directly with the owner is limited to the balance the owner still owes the party it did contract with, absent notice to the owner. No preliminary notice is required in Maine.

Citation: 10 M.R.S. §§ 3251, 3253, 3255(1), 3255(3), 3261

Source: https://www.mainelegislature.org/legis/statutes/10/title10ch201-Asec0.html

Commonly misstated, in two ways. First, Maine's lien chapter is in Title 10, not Title 33; several national references cite 33 M.R.S. § 3255, which does not contain it. Second, some sources describe the 120 days as running from recording the notice of lien. Section 3255(1) measures it from the last labor, materials or services furnished. A claimant who records on day 89 and then counts 120 days forward from that recording will file roughly three months late. Where the 90- and 120-day deadlines have both been missed, Maine allows a rarely used fallback, a lien by attachment within 180 days of last work, but it requires moving for attachment when suit is filed and persuading the court the claim is more likely than not to succeed at trial.

State unemployment insurance (SUTA)

The combined new-employer rate for 2026 is 2.54% (2.23% base UI rate plus 0.14% CSSF and 0.17% UPAF assessments). Experienced employers range from 0.00% to 6.29% before those add-on assessments.

Maine's 2026 adjusted UI rates for experienced employers run from 0.00% (Category 1) to 6.29% (Category 20) based on each employer's benefit-wage ratio experience. New employers are assigned a combined rate of 2.54%, made up of a 2.23% adjusted UI rate plus a 0.14% Competitive Skills Scholarship Fund (CSSF) charge and a 0.17% Unemployment Program Administrative Fund (UPAF) charge. The 2026 taxable wage base is $12,000 per employee, unchanged from 2025.

Citation: Maine Department of Labor, Bureau of Unemployment Compensation, 2026 UI Tax Rates

Source: https://www.maine.gov/unemployment/docs/2026/employers/uitaxrates2026.pdf

Last checked: 2026-08-26

The rate figures come from the Department of Labor's own 2026 rate document. The $12,000 wage base is not stated in that document and comes from a published compilation, so reconfirm the base on the department's site for a future filing year.

Workers' compensation rating

Maine is an NCCI state. NCCI publishes annual state advisory reports for Maine and the state's Bureau of Insurance approved a 9.6% average decrease in NCCI-filed loss costs effective 2025.

Maine relies on the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) for advisory workers' compensation loss cost filings, which the Maine Bureau of Insurance (part of the Department of Professional and Financial Regulation) reviews and approves. In 2025 the Bureau approved a 9.6% average decrease in workers' compensation loss costs.

Citation: Maine Department of Professional and Financial Regulation, Bureau of Insurance; NCCI State Advisory Resources, Maine

Source: https://www.maine.gov/pfr/insurance/press/maine-bureau-of-insurance-approves-96-average-decrease-in-workers-compensation-loss-costs

Prevailing wage law

Maine has a state prevailing wage law. It applies to state-funded construction contracts over $50,000.

Maine's prevailing wage requirements are codified in Title 26, Chapter 15 of the Maine Revised Statutes (Preference to Maine Works and Contractors), administered by the Maine Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Standards. The law applies to public works projects funded in whole or in part by state funds where the contract exceeds $50,000.

Citation: 26 M.R.S. Chapter 15

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/26/title26ch15.pdf

Comparative / contributory negligence rule

Modified comparative fault, recovery barred at 50% or more fault

Recovery is reduced in proportion to fault and barred once the worker is 50% or more at fault. A worker exactly 50% at fault recovers nothing.

Citation: 14 M.R.S. § 156

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/14/title14sec156.html

Verified against: statute text of 14 M.R.S. s 156

Non-economic damages cap

No general cap on non-economic damages

Most states cap non-economic damages only in medical malpractice actions, which does not reach a third-party construction claim. Economic losses, medical bills, lost wages, future earning capacity, are not capped by these statutes.

OSHA plan

Public-sector-only state plan; private construction sites remain under federal OSHA

Maine operates an OSHA-approved state plan covering public-sector employees only. Private construction sites remain under federal OSHA. That split decides where the file lives. A private construction site is inspected by a federal OSHA area office, with any citation contested before the federal Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission. A public employer on the same kind of work answers to the state plan instead, before the state's own review body. Reporting deadlines are the same either way: a work-related fatality within 8 hours, an inpatient hospitalisation, amputation or loss of an eye within 24 hours. For a construction claim the inspection file matters more than the citation: photographs, measurements, witness statements and the inspector's narrative are usually obtainable and are often the best contemporaneous record of the site.

Citation: 29 U.S.C. § 667; Maine public-employee safety plan

Source: https://www.osha.gov/stateplans/me

Weight of an OSHA violation in a negligence case

Maine treats a safety statute violation as some evidence of negligence, not negligence per se

The Maine Supreme Judicial Court affirmed a trial court's 'evidence of negligence' jury instruction regarding a defendant's violation of a noise control ordinance, characterized as akin to a safety statute, the same treatment OSHA violations receive under Maine's general approach to safety-statute violations.

Citation: Town of Stonington v. Galilean Gospel Temple, 1999 ME 2, 722 A.2d 1269, 1272.

Source: https://storage.googleapis.com/jnl-bcls-j-bclr-files/journals/1/articles/232/63a30c0a100a2.pdf

Third-party contribution against the employer

A third party (e.g., a project owner) generally cannot obtain contractual indemnification from an employer despite the employer's workers-comp immunity, UNLESS the indemnification clause contains a clear and explicit waiver of that immunity.

In Diamond Int'l Corp. v. Sullivan & Merritt, Inc., 493 A.2d 1043 (Me. 1985), the Maine Supreme Judicial Court held an indemnification clause unenforceable against the employer because it lacked a clear waiver of the employer's workers-comp immunity, reasoning that such interpretive standards 'safeguard from relinquishment the statutory immunity granted to employers, except in those circumstances where that immunity is explicitly waived.' Practically, this leaves an owner/third party exposed in defending a contractor-employee's claim (even where the contractor's own negligence caused the injury) unless the indemnity agreement explicitly and clearly waives the employer's immunity.

Citation: Diamond Int'l Corp. v. Sullivan & Merritt, Inc., 493 A.2d 1043 (Me. 1985).

Source: https://natlawreview.com/article/intersection-workers-compensation-immunity-and-contractual-indemnity

Injury-severity gate on contribution claims

Unusually narrow: Maine has no general intentional-tort or gross-negligence exception. The only statutory carve-out, added in 2023, covers sexual harassment and sexual assault.

Maine does not recognise an exception to employer exclusivity for gross negligence, recklessness, willful or wanton misconduct, or deliberate safety violations. A 2023 amendment to 39-A M.R.S.A. § 104 makes an employee, supervisor, officer or director personally liable for sexual harassment, sexual assault or an intentional tort related to either, but it does not impose that liability on the employer for another person's conduct. Failure to secure required coverage also forfeits immunity. In practice exclusivity takes the direct employer off the tort table entirely, whatever the OSHA file shows. The claim runs against the other parties on the site: the general contractor, the owner, another subcontractor, an equipment manufacturer. The employer or its carrier then asserts a lien against whatever the worker recovers from those parties, so the figure the worker actually keeps is the recovery less the lien, the fee and the costs. Whether the lien is reduced for the cost of obtaining the recovery is a separate state question worth asking early, because it moves the net more than most people expect.

Citation: Me. Rev. Stat. tit. 39-A; 39-A M.R.S.A. § 104 (as amended by LD 53, 2023).

Source: https://www.workerscompensation.com/daily-headlines/exclusive-remedy-in-maine/

Distinctive state doctrine

Essentially no intentional-conduct exception against the employer, paired with a criminal manslaughter provision tied to safety violations

Maine has no exception to exclusivity for injuries caused by the employer's gross negligence, reckless conduct, willful or wanton misconduct, or deliberate safety violations. Narrow exceptions exist only where the employer failed to maintain required coverage or the worker was an illegally employed minor. Maine pairs that civil strictness with a criminal provision at 17-A M.R.S. § 203(1)(C): a person with direct and personal management or control of an employment, a place of employment or another employee is guilty of manslaughter, a Class A crime, if that person intentionally or knowingly violates a state or federal occupational safety or health standard and the violation causes an employee's death. Separately, 39-A M.R.S. § 105-A presumes that anyone performing construction work on a construction site is an employee, rebuttable only where the worker meets the statutory definition of a construction subcontractor or owns or leases and operates their own equipment.

Citation: 17-A M.R.S. § 203(1)(C); 39-A M.R.S. § 408(2) (minor exception); 39-A M.R.S. § 105-A (construction employee-status presumption)

Source: https://legislature.maine.gov/statutes/17-A/title17-Asec203.html