Pre-Commencement Site RecordsProtecting Your Business from Pre-Existing Faults

The Real Cost of Pre-Existing Defects

Homeowners rarely inspect their properties in detail until building work starts. Once construction begins, clients scrutinise every square metre, often noticing diagonal settlement cracks, sticking sash windows, or spalling exterior brickwork for the very first time.

Under the Consumer Rights Act 2015, contractors are required to carry out work with reasonable care and skill. When a client notices a crack in a hallway ceiling three weeks into a kitchen extension, the burden of proving that your works did not cause it usually falls on you. Without baseline records, disproving causation is expensive, time-consuming, and damaging to trust.

What to Capture in a Pre-Commencement Record

A proper pre-commencement log goes beyond taking five generic photographs of the work zone. It must cover adjacent spaces, access pathways, and party structures that could conceivably be affected by plant, materials, or structural alterations.

Take high-resolution, date-stamped photographs and video walkthroughs of every relevant area. Pay special attention to existing finishes, damp staining, hairline plaster cracks, and external driveways that delivery lorries will cross.

• Access routes: Kerbs, driveways, garden paths, and hallway floors over which materials will be transported.
• Adjacent rooms: Ceilings, plaster cornices, and walls directly above or adjoining structural alterations.
• Existing services: Consumer units, boiler pressures, radiator valves, and external pipework before isolation or modification.
• Boundary features: Condition of neighbouring fences, garden walls, and shared drainage covers.

Embedding Baseline Logs into the Project Passport

A photo roll stored loosely on a site manager's mobile phone rarely stands up to scrutiny when a formal dispute arises. For records to hold weight, they must be shared, acknowledged, and permanently linked to the contract before site possession.

Incorporating your pre-start photographic survey directly into the project documentation or digital Project Passport ensures that both builder and homeowner start from an agreed baseline. When both parties confirm the initial survey prior to starting stage one, the risk of retrospective blame is eliminated.

Builder Standard provides independent verification tools to log and timestamp milestone records. We provide business documentation guidance, not legal advice, and do not hold or manage client funds.

Turning Baseline Checks into Client Reassurance

Some contractors hesitate to conduct extensive condition surveys, fearing it makes them look paranoid or litigious. In practice, professional clients view pre-commencement inspections as a mark of competence and thoroughness.

Explain to the client during the pre-start meeting that recording the condition of the home is standard practice to safeguard their property and establish baseline standards. Walking the site together to sign off the condition log sets a professional tone that reinforces confidence before ground is broken.

Sources & further reading

• Consumer Rights Act 2015 (Supply of Services)

  legislation.gov.uk

• Party Wall etc. Act 1996: Explanatory Booklet

  gov.uk

This article is editorial information for professional contractors, not legal advice. Builder Standard is an independent commercial platform. It is not a government body, statutory regulator or the Chartered Trading Standards Institute Approved Code Scheme, and it is not affiliated with any third-party scheme.