Construction Progress Review Preparation Checklist

Take the current drawing revisions with you rather than an older set, and note which revision you are holding on the front of the folder.

Owners frequently arrive holding a superseded sheet, which produces a long conversation about something that was resolved long ago.

Bring the list of questions left open at the end of the last visit, so the conversation starts where it stopped rather than beginning again.

Carrying the open list forward is what turns a series of visits into a process rather than a set of disconnected conversations.

Ask in advance which areas will be reachable and what the site expects of visitors, and follow whatever arrangements you are given.

A live site is a working environment with its own arrangements, and turning up unannounced helps nobody.

Site access and everything to do with conditions on site are the contractor's responsibility; arrange the visit with them and follow their requirements.

Agree beforehand who from the site or design team will walk round with you, since a walkaround alone rarely produces answers.

Questions asked at the point of looking get answered; questions written down for later usually do not get asked at all.

Write down the questions you want answered before you arrive, because on site it is easy to be shown things and forget what you came for.

A site visit is full of stimulus, and a short written list is the only reliable defence against leaving with nothing.

Ask whether there is a stage of the work that would be a better moment to see the things you are interested in.

Some things are only visible for a short period, and the site team knows when that is far better than you do.

Photograph the same views from roughly the same standing points on every visit, and keep those views consistent throughout the project.

A consistent set shows change clearly, whereas scattered pictures of interesting details show almost nothing when compared.

Note what has appeared since your last visit and, just as usefully, what has not moved at all.

Areas that have not changed are worth asking about, and they are easy to overlook while looking at the parts that have.

Note what materials have arrived, where they are being stored, and ask what anything unfamiliar is for.

Deliveries indicate what is about to happen, which is often more informative than what has already happened.

Record anything that has been removed, opened up or altered that you were not expecting, and ask about it while you are standing there.

Unexpected changes usually have a good reason, but the reason is far easier to obtain in the moment than afterwards.

Note where work has moved into an area you did not expect it to reach yet, and ask what prompted that.

Sequence changes for practical reasons and it is useful to understand them rather than to be surprised by their consequences.

Note the conditions during your visit — weather, standing water, dust, drying — since they explain much of what you are looking at.

A photograph taken in poor conditions is easily misread later unless the conditions were recorded alongside it.

Stand in each formed room with the plan in your hand and check that openings, walls and features are where you understood them to be.

Rooms read very differently in the flesh, and this is the moment when an owner is most likely to notice a genuine misunderstanding.

Comparing a room with a drawing is not an inspection of the work; the adequacy of what is built is for qualified professionals to establish.

Where something is in a different place from the drawing, raise it as a question rather than as an instruction to change anything.

Differences frequently have a reason you have not been told yet, and asking first keeps the conversation productive.

Ask which differences are deliberate and already agreed, and which are new to the person answering you.

The distinction matters enormously and is usually clear immediately if the question is asked plainly.

Where something looks different from what you expected, ask what governs that dimension rather than measuring it yourself and drawing a conclusion.

Owner measurements taken on a live site are frequently taken from surfaces that are not finished, which leads to confident but wrong conclusions.

Dimensions, tolerances and what governs them are professional matters; ask the design team rather than judging from your own measurement.

Ask which drawing revision the site team is working from, and check it against the revision you are holding.

This single question resolves a surprising proportion of apparent discrepancies before they become arguments.

Ask what has been agreed verbally that you have not yet seen in writing, and ask for those items to be confirmed.

Verbal agreements accumulate quietly on every project, and they are the source of most later disagreement.

How changes are agreed and recorded follows whatever the arrangement between the parties provides for; take advice if you are unsure.

Ask what is due to be covered, boarded, filled or backfilled before your next visit, and look at those areas first.

Prioritising by what is about to disappear is the single most useful way to spend a limited amount of time on site.

Photograph service runs, insulation and fixings before they are concealed, working through each room in a consistent order.

These photographs answer questions for decades, and they can only be taken during a short window.

Check whether the positions you previously marked are still visible and still where you intended, while the wall is open.

This is the last opportunity to notice that a position was misread, and correcting it now is trivial.

Ask who records the position of anything laid underground before it is backfilled, and whether that record will be given to you.

Buried services and drainage become guesswork very quickly unless somebody deliberately records them.

Recording buried work is the responsibility of the parties carrying it out; ask what will be provided rather than relying on your own photographs alone.

Note where a pipe, duct or cable route differs from what you had been told, and raise it before the area is closed.

Routes change on site for practical reasons, and it takes very little effort to have the change explained while it is visible.

Ask whether anyone else needs to see the work before it is covered, and confirm locally what applies to this stage.

Some stages involve others attending, and the sequence is easier to accommodate when it is known in advance.

Whether any third party has to attend before work is covered is determined by qualified professionals and the relevant authority.

Ask plainly what the site is waiting for from you, and write the list down in the order it is needed.

The answer is usually short and specific, and it is rarely volunteered unless the question is asked.

Ask which other work depends on each outstanding decision, so you can see which ones genuinely matter most.

Not all pending choices are equal, and knowing the dependencies lets you spend your attention where it counts.

Record which decisions are already settled and where they were written down, so they are not quietly reopened in conversation on site.

Settled decisions get revisited surprisingly often, usually because nobody can find where they were recorded.

Record any sample, finish or fitting you were shown, where you saw it and exactly what you said about it.

Reactions to samples are easily remembered differently by two people, and a note written on the day settles it.

Note where a choice you have not made is starting to affect other work, and say so rather than letting it drift.

Naming the problem yourself is far more comfortable than having it presented to you as a consequence later.

Agree how a decision made in conversation on site is confirmed afterwards, and use the same route every time.

Consistency in how decisions are confirmed is worth more than any single well-written email.

Agree in writing who is able to instruct a change, and make sure everyone involved knows the answer rather than assuming it.

Instructions given informally by whoever is present are among the most common sources of later disagreement.

How changes may be instructed follows the arrangement between the parties; take advice from a suitably qualified adviser if it is unclear.

Record every request you make on site in one place, whether it seemed small at the time or not.

Small requests accumulate, and the ones nobody wrote down are the ones that turn out to have consequences.

Ask that anything described to you as a change or variation is written down before it is carried out.

A change agreed in conversation and carried out immediately is very hard to reconstruct afterwards.

How variations are valued and recorded is a professional and contractual matter; do not agree to anything you do not understand.

Note where you have been asked to confirm something you are not qualified to judge, and pass it to the appropriate professional instead.

Owners are sometimes asked to settle technical points simply because they are the person standing there.

Technical adequacy, compliance and safety are never owner determinations; route them to a qualified professional every time.

Keep a numbered list of open queries showing who is answering each one and whether it is still open.

A numbered list makes it possible to refer to an item unambiguously, which shortens every subsequent conversation.

Ask what information the site is still waiting for from the designer, engineer or a supplier, and who is following it up.

Missing information is frequently the real reason an area has stalled, and it is not always obvious from looking at it.

Write your own note of the visit the same day, in your own words, and keep it with that visit's photographs.

Your note does not replace anyone else's record, but it captures what you understood, which is what matters to you.

Send your note to the people who were there and ask them to correct anything they see differently, rather than assuming agreement.

Inviting correction converts a private impression into a shared record, and disagreements surface while they are still small.

Mark which items from the previous visit are now closed and which are being carried forward, and keep the numbering consistent.

Consistent numbering across visits is what makes the running list usable rather than a growing pile of notes.

File photographs by area as well as by visit, so that the whole history of one room can be found in one place later.

The question asked in future is almost always about a particular room, not about a particular visit.

Write down anything you were told that surprised you, even if it seemed minor, and note who told you.

Surprises are often the first sign of a misunderstanding, and they are easy to dismiss and then forget.

Note what was promised verbally and ask for the items that matter to be confirmed in writing before the next visit.

This is a routine and reasonable request, and it is much easier to make on the day than after something has gone wrong.

If a verbal agreement has commercial or contractual consequences, take advice from a suitably qualified adviser rather than relying on a note.