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Keep what you actually sent, not the working file

Save the application exactly as issued, ideally as a PDF, apart from the spreadsheet you'll roll forward next month. "Which version did they get?" should never be a research project.

Updated: . By Jack Butler-Kettle, Construction Claims Consultant.

Why it matters

The spreadsheet you build the application in keeps changing. It is rolled forward next month, corrected when a measure is revised and reformatted when someone tidies it. After 6 months it no longer shows what your main contractor received on any given date. Nobody can reliably say which version they got. That matters the day your main contractor says the application it received left out an item, or showed a different sum. A PDF saved as issued, in the cycle folder, is the application, frozen. The spreadsheet is a tool. Keep them apart.

How to do it

  1. Print the finished application to PDF, with the date and cycle number in the file name.
  2. Send the PDF, not the spreadsheet, and save the PDF in the cycle folder beside the sent email.
  3. Keep the working spreadsheet in a separate working folder and roll it forward from there.
  4. Never edit the issued PDF. If you send a revised application, save it as a new dated PDF.

Example

Illustrative example. The scenario and figures are invented.

The facts

A subcontractor's application five includes a £14,000 line for materials on site. Three cycles later, the main contractor's assessor says application five never included that line. The assessor refuses the sum as a new item, out of time. The subcontractor's spreadsheet has been rolled forward three times since.

What happens

  1. The QS opens the cycle five folder and finds the PDF saved as issued, with the sent email beside it.
  2. The PDF shows the £14,000 materials line on page two, and the sent email shows the PDF as the attachment.
  3. The QS sends both to the assessor with a note of the page reference.
  4. The assessor accepts the line was applied for in cycle five and values it.

The outcome

The £14,000 is valued in the current cycle. If the only record had been the rolled-forward spreadsheet, the subcontractor could not have shown what the assessor received. The sum would have been argued over, not paid.

To have this set up for you, see our Underpayment Prevention service.