Court Specification Review Preparation Checklist

List every drawing, specification, schedule, note and message you have been given about the court, including anything that arrived informally.

Court information often arrives in pieces across several conversations, and the pieces nobody listed are the ones that later contradict each other.

Check that every sheet carries a date or a version marking, and ask for one where it does not, since documents circulate and diverge quickly.

An undated sheet cannot later be told apart from the one that replaced it, and both will still be in circulation somewhere.

Note who issued each document, since a description written by a contractor and a drawing prepared by an independent professional carry quite different weight.

Knowing the author tells you whose interest the document serves and which questions it was never intended to answer.

List every drawing, schedule or document referred to inside the papers that you have not actually been given, and ask for each of them.

Documents commonly refer to material the owner has never seen, and the missing pieces are frequently where the important detail sits.

Keep the whole set in one place with your own brief beside it, since a review carried out from scattered attachments misses whatever was not attached.

A review assembled from a mailbox is a review of whatever happened to be to hand that afternoon.

Check that the sports and the level of play you described appear somewhere in the document, and ask where they are addressed if you cannot find them.

A court designed around a different assumption about level of play looks identical on paper and behaves quite differently in use.

Check that the users, hours and pattern of play you described are reflected, including any school session, club night or shared arrangement you mentioned.

Pattern of use drives decisions about access, surfacing and lighting, and it is the part of a brief most easily lost between conversations.

Look for the wet corner, the shaded end, the tree or the awkward access you recorded, and ask about each one that does not appear anywhere.

Site observations supplied by an owner have a habit of disappearing between the visit and the document, and their absence is worth a direct question.

List anything you asked for that you cannot find, and ask whether it was left out deliberately, moved elsewhere or simply not carried through.

Omissions are often deliberate and well founded, but nobody explains the reasoning unless the omission is noticed and queried.

Mark anything present that you did not ask for and do not understand, and ask why it is there rather than assuming it must be necessary.

Unexplained additions are sometimes essential and sometimes left over from another project, and only a question separates the two.

Look for whatever the document assumes about the ground or the existing base, and ask what happens to the rest of it if that assumption proves wrong.

What lies beneath a court is established by a qualified professional through investigation, and no document can settle it on your behalf.

Look for what the document assumes about where water goes, including any outfall, connection or soakaway, and ask who has confirmed that route is available.

Where water may be discharged, and by what route, is settled by a qualified professional with whoever is responsible for the receiving system.

Where the work builds on an existing court, look for what is assumed about its condition, and ask what would be done if the surface came up differently.

Documents for renewal work often assume a sound base without saying so, and that single assumption carries most of the risk in the job.

Look for what the document assumes about reaching the court with plant and materials, and set that against the route you actually have.

Access assumptions are made from a plan rather than from the gate, and the gate is where they usually fail.

Look for what is said about buried services, and check whether it states these were investigated or merely that none were encountered.

Buried services must be traced by suitably qualified people; the absence of a note in a document is not evidence that nothing is there.

Look at what is shown where the court meets grass, paving, kerbs or a bank, and ask what happens at any point where the drawing simply stops.

The line where a drawing ends is a real place on the ground, and somebody has to decide what happens there sooner or later.

Note where the drawings show ground falling and ask where water is intended to run, without attempting to judge whether the arrangement works.

Falls, levels and drainage arrangements are for a qualified professional to determine, and nothing here substitutes for that.

Check whether posts, sockets, anchors, covers and any existing fittings appear on the drawings, and ask what is assumed about the ones already in the ground.

Existing fittings are routinely absent from new drawings, and they do not disappear from the court merely because nobody drew them.

Check the position of any opening or gate shown against the way people, kit and machinery would actually arrive, and say so where the two do not match.

An opening placed for the drawing rather than for arrival is a daily irritation that lasts as long as the court does.

Look for anything described as indicative, approximate or subject to confirmation, and list every one of them as a question still open.

Items marked indicative have a way of becoming final without anybody deciding, and listing them is the only defence against that.

Note which sports the document shows markings for, and check that list against the sports you actually described in your brief.

Which markings apply to a sport and level of play is confirmed with the relevant governing body, not read off a drawing.

Where several sports are marked, ask which set of lines is intended to read most clearly in play and record what you are told.

On a shared court somebody always ends up with the less legible lines, and it is better that this is a decision than an accident.

Check whether nets, posts, sockets, hoops or rebound surfaces appear anywhere, and ask who is supplying and fitting each item listed.

Equipment sits at the boundary between the court works and your own purchasing, and it is the item most often assumed by both sides.

Ask who is confirming the layout with the governing body, and record the answer, since it is frequently assumed that somebody else has already done it.

Confirmation of any playing layout rests with the relevant governing body and must be obtained directly rather than inferred.

Note any sport you might want on the court later that does not appear, and ask what would have to change to allow for it rather than assuming it can be added.

Later additions are far easier to raise while a document is still in draft than to introduce once the court has been laid.

Mark where the document hands over from one trade to another, and ask who is responsible on each side of that handover.

Handovers described in passing are the joins that later nobody claims, particularly between base, surface and enclosure.

Find whatever the document lists as excluded or by others, and turn that list into your own list of things somebody still has to arrange.

The exclusions list is where the owner tasks are hiding, and it is usually the shortest and least read part of the document.

Look for what the document says about protecting the ground, the boundary and any planting while work goes on, and ask directly if it says nothing.

What protection a site needs varies with the method chosen, so ask for it to be described by the contractor in writing rather than assumed from the drawings.

Check what the document says about making good the ground the work has to cross, since the route in is the part nobody thinks to write down.

Damage along the access route is a common source of ill feeling on a court project and among the easiest things to settle in advance.

Ask who is expected to look over the finished work on your behalf, and whether that person is independent of the people carrying it out.

Any review of completed work must be carried out by a suitably qualified person; nothing in a preparation list serves that purpose.

Mark the technical sections plainly as outside your competence rather than skimming past them, and pass them to a qualified professional to review.

Technical review of a court specification requires a qualified professional; reading it as a lay owner is not a substitute for that.

Mark anything concerning foundations, supports, retaining or anything holding a load, and note that you are not in a position to comment on it.

Structural content is for a qualified engineer to review, and is not something an owner is in a position to assess or comment on.

Mark anything concerning cabling, ducts, supply or lighting equipment, and pass it to somebody suitably qualified rather than forming a view.

Electrical content must be reviewed and any work carried out by suitably qualified people, with local requirements confirmed.

Mark anything the document says about consents, notifications or approvals, and take each of those to the local authority yourself rather than relying on it.

Consents and notifications depend on where the court is and how it will be used, so take each one directly to the local authority rather than relying on a written statement.

Mark anything touching on how many people the court is expected to hold, how they get out, or how they reach it, and route those to qualified professionals.

Fire safety, occupancy, means of escape and accessibility are determined by qualified professionals and the local authority alone.

Write your questions in the order the document raises them, naming the sheet and section, so nothing has to be hunted for during the conversation.

Questions delivered in the order of the document get answered; questions delivered as a list of worries tend not to.

Separate your preferences from your questions, since a designer can act on a preference but only a qualified professional can answer a technical query.

Mixing the two produces a reply that addresses the easy half, and the technical half quietly goes unanswered.

Ask for a plain-language explanation of any part you cannot follow, and record the answer next to that part rather than in a separate message.

An explanation stored away from the clause it explains is lost the moment the document is revised.

Record which version of the document your comments related to, and keep that version unchanged alongside your marked-up copy.

Comments made on a superseded version are the classic source of confusion, and dating them takes a moment at the time.

Ask how your comments will be dealt with and whether you will see a revised set, so that a review does not disappear into a conversation.

Without an agreed route back, comments are absorbed rather than answered, and nobody notices until the work is under way.