Site rules for contractors

In order to ensure that a construction project is carried out safely and with minimum stress, it’s useful to have a series of ground rules in place. This allows both you and the contractor to know what each can expect from the other.

Site rules

Whilst the planning of any building work is important, you’re also responsible for managing the contractors once they have arrived on your site. To make the whole process easier, you should set out some ground rules before work starts. Apart from avoiding frayed nerves on both sides, this will ensure that each knows what’s expected of the other. For example, the time to determine who will provide first aid to contractors is before work starts and not after a nasty accident! For this reason, it’s useful to have a basic sheet of Site Rules for Contractors. These rules can easily be adapted for the needs of your own workplace, but should cover the most common areas, such as housekeeping. Our sample contains 15 points.

Security issues

In this time of heightened security risks, it’s very important to be aware of just who is on your premises each day. For this reason, our site rules start with three points on security-related issues. These require that a list of contractor names is provided to you before any work starts and that any amendments are notified to you. The third point is a standard rule that all personnel must sign in and out each day. This is not just for security purposes, but also for fire safety, so you know if anyone is unaccounted for in the event of an emergency.

During building work

The other points focus on the areas that can easily lead to problems if communication between the parties is not what it should be. Our rules focus on the need to record any accidents in your accident book, to remind contractors of the need to abide by health and safety legislation and to follow your fire evacuation procedures. To give these rules some teeth, we would advise that you obtain a signature from the contractor’s manager or supervisor before work starts in order to confirm that they have been understood and accepted.