Who the deadlines apply to
Rhode Island's timetable sits in R.I. Gen. Laws ch. 34-28, and no rule on this page is limited by project type.
At the preliminary notice stage, § 34-28-4.1 reaches a person contracting directly with the owner, lessee or tenant, or owner of less than the fee simple, other than a material supplier [1]. The table lists that rule for direct contractors. Subcontractors, sub-subcontractors, suppliers and laborers have a separate row that reads None required [2].
From the notice of intention onward, the default rows name all five roles: direct contractors, subcontractors, sub-subcontractors, suppliers and laborers [2] [5]. Two lien filing rows apply only under a condition, and each is described below with that condition first.
How the periods run
Before work starts. The direct contractor's notice has no counted date. Its period is Any time prior to commencing work or delivery of materials [1]. Section 34-28-4.1 states what follows without it: that person may not claim a lien under the chapter, and indemnifies and holds harmless the owner, lessee or tenant, or owner of less than the fee simple from any payment or costs incurred on account of liens claimed by those not in privity with them, unless that owner has not paid that person [1]. The same section says the failure does not affect any other person's claim, provided the chapter's procedures are followed [1].
The notice of intention. The claimant mails a notice of intention and files a copy in the land evidence records of the city or town where the land lies. Both steps carry the same label: Before or within two hundred (200) days after the doing of the work or the furnishing of the materials [2]. Missing them leaves the lien void and wholly lost [2]. The calculator counts no date for these rows, since the doing of the work is not one of the dates it takes.
The mailing and the filing, together with the mailing of another copy "as herein below provided", perfect the lien, subject to the chapter's other sections, as to work done or materials furnished during the two hundred days prior to the filing and thereafter [2].
Architects and engineers. For the lien of any architect or engineer, or of any immediate or mediate subcontractor thereto, for work done in connection with the construction, erection, alteration, or reparation, the result of which is used therein, § 34-28-7 sets its own lien filing row: Before the later of two hundred (200) days of the performance of the work or ten (10) days after the actual and visible commencement, by excavation or otherwise, of the construction, erection, alteration or reparation [4]. The row names direct contractors, subcontractors and sub-subcontractors.
A returned notice. If the mailed notice of intention is returned to the person mailing it, not having been delivered for any reason, the lien filing row reads Within thirty (30) days after the return of the notice of intention, and in no event more than two hundred (200) days after the mailing of the notice [2]. The notice is filed with the envelope it came back in; otherwise the lien is void and wholly lost [2].
The suit. Section 34-28-10(a) pairs a complaint to enforce the lien with a notice of lis pendens. The period is 40 days after the notice of intention is recorded [5], and the calculator counts it from the recording date entered. Unless both are filed in time, the lien is void and wholly lost [5].
Counting the days
Under R.I. Gen. Laws § 43-3-13, when time is reckoned from a day, a date or an act, that day is left out of the computation [6].
What changed recently
Sections 34-28-4 and 34-28-9 were last amended by P.L. 2008, ch. 75 and ch. 345 [2] [3]. Section 34-28-4.1 was last amended by P.L. 2015, ch. 258 and ch. 279 [1], and §§ 34-28-7 and 34-28-10 by P.L. 2006, ch. 630 [4] [5].