Statutory interest rate
6% / year, fixed (or the contract's rate, if higher and lawful)
Prejudgment interest is discretionary; courts/juries may award it from a date the court fixes, applying this rate.
Virginia · Construction claims reference
Construction Claim Rules in Virginia
Every figure below is the researched rule for Virginia, with its citation and a direct link to the official source so you can confirm it yourself. Covers statutory interest and when it starts accruing, how Actual Cash Value is determined and whether labor can be depreciated, whether a “no damages for delay” clause is enforceable and how long you have to file, the state-specific inputs behind a fully burdened labor rate, and who can be held liable for a construction-site injury.
Statutory Interest & Accrual in Virginia
The rate itself, and the date interest starts running, which differs by claim type in most states.
Accrual: breach of contract claim
Fully discretionary: the jury or court fixes the start date itself; absent that, interest runs only from judgment entry
Va. Code § 8.01-382 lets the verdict, judgment or decree itself fix the period at which prejudgment interest begins to run. If no specific date is fixed, interest instead runs from the date of judgment (or verdict) entry, not automatically from the date of breach.
This is a genuinely discretionary mechanism; don't assume a date-of-breach default without the fact-finder having actually fixed one.
Accrual: property damage / tort claim
Same discretionary mechanism as contract claims: no automatic date-of-loss rule
The same statute, Va. Code § 8.01-382, applies to property-damage and other tort claims; the jury or court may fix an accrual date, which could be the date of loss, but if it doesn't, interest defaults to running only from judgment entry.
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Actual Cash Value & Property Loss in Virginia
How ACV is determined, whether labor cost can be depreciated, and the rules on releasing withheld recoverable depreciation.
Actual Cash Value rule
Replacement cost minus depreciation (regulatory)
Defined directly in insurance regulation for homeowners' policy loss-settlement clauses; may not cover every property/casualty line; verify the policy type.
This regulation is specific to homeowners' policy minimum language; for other lines, case-law broad-evidence reasoning could apply instead.
ACV statute or regulation
Virginia's insurance regulation sets a basic ACV and replacement-cost payment structure, and the Bureau of Insurance has separately taken the position that labor and other nontangible costs cannot be depreciated.
14 VAC 5-342-70, part of Virginia's Rules Governing Underwriting Practices and Coverage Limitations and Exclusions for Property Insurance, requires that for actual cash value settlements an insurer pay the smaller of the cost to repair or replace with like kind and quality or the actual cash value of the damaged property, and requires payment of the full replacement cost without deduction for depreciation once repairs are complete under replacement-cost coverage, subject to any insurance-to-value based reduction. Separately, in Administrative Letter 2025-06 (reported as issued October 31, 2025), the Virginia State Corporation Commission's Bureau of Insurance advised licensed property insurers that they may not depreciate labor or other nontangible costs such as taxes, fees and overhead when calculating ACV, reasoning that depreciation properly applies only to physical materials that degrade over time, and characterized doing so as an unfair claim settlement practice. Administrative Letters are Bureau guidance interpreting Virginia's unfair claim settlement practices statute rather than a separately enacted labor-depreciation statute.
The Administrative Letter itself could not be located and read directly in this research; the Bureau's administrative-letters index page blocked automated access. Its existence, number and content are drawn from secondary compliance-industry summaries, so treat the letter number and date as reported by those sources rather than independently confirmed against the primary document.
Recoverable depreciation holdback
No Virginia statute or regulation found governing the deadline or process for paying out withheld depreciation after repairs are completed.
14 VAC 5-342-70 addresses how ACV and replacement cost payments are structured but does not set a deadline or notice requirement specific to releasing recoverable depreciation once repairs are finished.
Checked the applicable property-insurance loss-settlement regulation directly; no holdback-timing provision was found.
Delay Claims in Virginia
Whether a no-damages-for-delay clause will be enforced against you, and the deadline for bringing a construction contract claim.
“No damages for delay” clause enforceability
Void by statute: on public contracts outright, plus on subcontracts signed before work begins
Virginia voids, as against public policy, any public-construction-contract provision that waives, releases, or extinguishes a contractor's right to recover costs or damages for unreasonable delay, though the statute still permits provisions letting the public body recover delay costs the contractor caused, requiring delay notice, providing liquidated damages, or setting a dispute-resolution procedure. A separate, newer statute voids a similar waiver in a subcontract, lower-tier subcontract, or supply agreement when that waiver is signed before any labor, services, or materials are provided; at least one federal court applying Virginia law has read that statute to reach delay damages specifically.
Virginia has two separate statutory overrides depending on contract tier (public prime contract vs. subcontract/supply agreement); confirm which one applies to your specific contract relationship.
Construction contract filing deadline
5 years for a signed written contract
Virginia's limitations period for an action on a contract that is in writing and signed by the party to be charged (or their agent) is 5 years, whether or not the writing is under seal, covering an ordinary written construction-contract claim.
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Labor Burden Inputs in Virginia
The state-specific rates and requirements that sit underneath a fully burdened hourly labor cost.
State unemployment insurance (SUTA)
Virginia's new employer rate is 2.5 percent, the experience-rated range runs from roughly 0.1 percent to 6.2 percent, and the taxable wage base remains $8,000.
The Virginia Employment Commission (VEC) assigns new employers a rate of 2.5 percent (plus applicable administrative fees) until they accumulate sufficient experience. Established, experience-rated employers range from roughly 0.1 percent to 6.2 percent based on their benefit-charge history. The taxable wage base remains $8,000 per employee for 2026, one of the lower wage bases nationally.
These figures come from a payroll-industry secondary source, not a direct fetch of the Virginia Employment Commission's own rate publication. They should be reconfirmed directly on vec.virginia.gov before being treated as authoritative, particularly the exact experience-rated range for 2026. Confirmed directly against the official Virginia Employment Commission employer page (vec.virginia.gov).
Workers' compensation rating
Virginia is an NCCI advisory state; workers' compensation rates are based on NCCI loss costs, regulated by the Virginia State Corporation Commission's Bureau of Insurance.
Virginia participates in the NCCI system for classification codes and advisory loss costs. Insurers file their own rates using NCCI loss costs as a base, subject to regulation by the Virginia State Corporation Commission (SCC), Bureau of Insurance. Virginia is a competitive, non-monopolistic state, and coverage is mandatory for employers with two or more employees.
Prevailing wage law
Virginia reinstated a state prevailing wage law effective May 1, 2021, covering public contracts of $250,000 or more where the state provides funding, or where a locality has adopted a prevailing wage ordinance.
Virginia repealed its earlier prevailing wage law decades ago, then reinstated one through 2020 legislation (effective May 1, 2021), sometimes called Virginia's Little Davis-Bacon Act. It applies to public contracts of $250,000 or more for the construction, alteration, improvement, maintenance, or repair of public facilities, where either a state government unit or instrumentality provides any funding, or a locality has adopted an ordinance requiring prevailing wage compliance for locally funded projects. Wage rates are based on U.S. Department of Labor Davis-Bacon determinations. Contractors who underpay face liability for back wages plus 8 percent annual interest and possible debarment from future public contracts.
Construction Site Injury & Third-Party Liability in Virginia
OSHA enforcement structure, how much weight an OSHA violation carries in a negligence case, and whether an injured worker's own employer can be pulled back in.
OSHA plan
Full state plan (VOSH), private + public sector
Virginia operates VOSH (Virginia Occupational Safety and Health), a full OSHA-approved state plan covering both private and public-sector employers.
Weight of an OSHA violation in a negligence case
Genuinely undecided by the Virginia Supreme Court; the court has explicitly declined to resolve this question, now directly confirmed
The Virginia Supreme Court has explicitly declined to articulate the proper relationship, under Virginia law, between OSHA violations and negligence per se, assuming without deciding the question in at least one case. This means Virginia's answer to this specific question remains genuinely open at the state's highest court, not merely under-researched by this dataset: a real, citable finding of non-decision rather than a gap in this research.
Third-party contribution against the employer
Virginia's statutory-employer doctrine is central and can shield a GC on multi-tier projects, not just the direct employer.
Va. Code §65.2-302's statutory-employer doctrine is described as central on multi-tier projects; meaning a GC higher up the contracting chain may be just as immune as the direct employer, not automatically exposed to third-party suit.
Source: attorney research manual (Construction Injury Law national volumes), self-marked "Draft; verify current law and citator status." Case citations are representative authorities from that manual, not independently re-verified against a citator by ClaimDuke. Confirmed real (254 Va. 79 (1997)), but the accessible substance is about hospital/nurse independent-contractor status and respondeat superior, not squarely a construction statutory-employer case. Related doctrine (the control-based employer/independent-contractor test), but not a clean topical match -- flagged for a closer look rather than treated as fully on point.
Injury-severity gate on contribution claims
Exclusive against both the direct employer and any qualifying statutory employer under the §65.2-302 statutory-employer doctrine: this source doesn't name a separate piercing exception.
Va. Code §§65.2-100 et seq. generally makes compensation exclusive against the employer and statutory employer. The statutory-employer doctrine under §65.2-302 is central on multi-tier projects; the manual doesn't identify a further piercing exception.
Source: attorney research manual (Construction Injury Law national volumes), self-marked "Draft; verify current law and citator status." Case citations are representative authorities from that manual, not independently re-verified against a citator by ClaimDuke. Same citation as thirdPartyContribution for this state -- confirmed real, but the accessible substance is about hospital/nurse independent-contractor status, not squarely a construction case.
Distinctive state doctrine
Statutory employer doctrine; narrows liability by extending exclusivity up the contractor chain
When a contractor hires a subcontractor to perform work that fulfills the contractor's own contract, the contractor becomes the 'statutory employer' of the subcontractor's employees, even if the contractor doesn't normally perform that type of work through direct employees. The test asks whether the work is part of the contractor's normal 'trade, business, or occupation'; work normally carried on through employees rather than independent contractors. Practical effect: an injured sub's employee typically cannot sue the GC in tort at all; workers' comp exclusivity extends to the GC too. This is the functional opposite of Washington's Stute doctrine (which broadens GC liability); Virginia narrows it.
Put these Virginia rules to work on your own numbers
ClaimDuke's calculators compute delay and extended overhead (Eichleay), fully burdened labor rates, ACV/RCV property loss, litigation interest and construction-injury settlement ranges. Every calculation is free and live; a documented, citation-backed report is $19.
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This page is reference information for your own verification. It is not legal advice and is not a substitute for confirming the current rule with the official source linked above or with counsel. Several states' interest rates float and reset on a schedule (monthly, quarterly or annually), so always check the live source for the figure as of today rather than relying on what is shown here. Which rule actually applies to your specific claim is itself a legal question this page cannot answer for you.