Is Looking For A Health And Safety File Wasting Your Time And Costing You Money?

The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (CDM2015) enshrines in law the requirement for every builder or tradesman to complete a construction phase plan before commencing work. But what it actually involves is often confusing, leading to mix-ups with other health and safety file templates, omissions and a lot of wasted time.

Confusion Is Rife

If you’ve ever been asked for a health and safety file pre construction, you should know that in many cases, failing to submit one will mean you don’t get the job. This document, often mistakenly referred to as the health and safety file, sets out your risk assessments, your emergency information and shows that you’re a reputable tradesperson who has done their homework on the project they’re undertaking.

But, if you’ve been asked to submit one for the first time and are searching the term ‘health and safety file template’ in order for you use it to complete a health and safety file, you may end up finding a raft of documents that all seem to contain conflicting information about what you need to include. This could lead to you spending an awful lot of your time reading, rather than quoting, or better yet, getting on with your work. In some cases, it may be tempting to give the whole process up as a bad job, and while this shouldn’t happen, as it goes against regulations, the truth is, in some cases, it does.

What Do I Need – A Health And Safety File or A Construction Phase Plan

If you’re asked for a health and safety file, what you may really need is a Construction Phase Plan. Sole or principal contractors in a project are required to complete a Construction Phase Plan to manage health and safety risks before the construction site is set up or work commences.

Usually, a Health and Safety file will have within it data around the works undertaken and any hazards that have not been dealt with during the design and construction phases. In addition, some information on the building and any restrictions, such as the location of utility services, will also be included.

It can also make note of any hazardous materials used, which will prove useful when dealing with these substances, as well as  info about the building as it has been built: including safe means of access to service areas

What Options Are There For The Health and Safety File

You could opt to keep searching for a health and safety document template for your Construction Phase Plan, spending time going through all the files available to download and completing the documentation to the best of your abilities. But this, for the uninitiated, could lead to errors or worse, omissions that mean you don’t cover all the bases you should.

Another option could be to pay a consultant to complete the health and safety file for you, or send you their health and safety file template to fill in. The only problem with this is, while you could have more confidence that things were being done properly, is that the cost of this could significantly affect your profit.

What Happens If I Don’t Complete The Health And Safety File?

Failure to complete CDM2015’s pre-work requirements could be devastating to your business. Not only could it mean you fail to reduce risk on the site, which could lead to injury, but a breach of the legal requirements could leave you with hefty fines and a poor business reputation. It could also leave you facing compensation claims for those injured due to your failure to protect their health and safety. You may even struggle to find contractors to work with on future projects. After all, contractors aren’t likely to work with those who don’t take their health and safety seriously.

Isn’t There An App For That?

Luckily, we have developed an app to help you meet all your health and safety file requirements. Ohutu is designed to avoid confusion, help you meet all your pre-work paperwork and legal requirements, as well as giving you a few other useful features too.

Personalisation

While Health and Safety file document templates are readily available online, searching for templates to meet your Construction Phase Plan requirements can be a nightmare. Finding a template tailored to your specific requirements could take up more of your time than it needs to. Ohutu makes the whole process quick and easy. Simply start your trial, answer a few project-specific questions, then, once the questionnaire is complete, create and administrate your projects with ease through the web.

All the pre-construction information you need

You get all you need to begin your project well-prepared and adhering to legal requirements. Our app can help you create all the pre-construction documentation you need, including the CDM 2015 Construction Phase Plan, a site set-up list, relevant display documentation, RAMS, COSHH, site induction information, site rules and accident reporting.

All this is automatically created for you. And, perhaps more importantly, we show you what to do with it, where it needs to go and who needs to see it.  Having the Ohutu app means you have all the information you need, readily available, without the sky-high price of a consultant.

Added features

We don’t just help with pre-construction either. You can benefit from the app’s features right the way through your project. Features include:

• Instant Construction Phase Plan – Specific to your project and your business, available in minutes.
• HSE leaflets – No need to spend ££ on the poster. We have all the leaflets you need within the app.
• Health and Safety Policy Creation – An important document, particularly if you have staff working for you, we create your policy for you.
• Red Button Emergency – Always knows where you are and where the nearest A+E is. The app even gives you directions.
• Address Book Built-In – We help you keep details of your architects, engineers, contractors and site supervisors securely stored. Our easy-to access app allows you to find them when you need them and protect the security of their personal data.
• Real-time Address Search – Simply start typing and the rest will automatically pop up. Saving you time.
• COVID-19 Advice, Posters and More! – Keeping, you, your customers and staff safe during the pandemic.

We know you want your business to meet its legal obligations and run smoothly but you don’t want to spend a fortune on consultancy. Ohutu was created with your needs in mind, allowing you to easily and efficiently comply with health and safety requirements without wasting time and money. Why not take a look to see how easy health and safety compliance could be by taking advantage of our free trial?