Risk assessments and method statements

Signed at the gate,
not in the office.

A RAMS that nobody doing the work has read is a document rather than a control. The clock-in pulls today's by trade, the operative signs it on the phone, and the record says which version.

Book a demo → The module it sits in

Steel fixers working in a deep excavation, the kind of activity a method statement is written for

In plain terms

RAMS stands for risk assessment and method statement, and it is two documents that travel together. The risk assessment names the hazards in a task, who could be harmed and what controls reduce that risk to an acceptable level. The method statement sets out the sequence the work will actually be carried out in, with the plant, the permits, the PPE and the people it needs.

Unibuild holds them against the trade and against the job, delivers them to the operative on a phone at the point the work starts, and records who accepted which version and when. The duty to assess the risk is yours and stays yours; what changes is that the acceptance is evidence rather than a recollection.

How RAMS usually work

Written for the tender. Filed for the audit. Read by nobody.

Which is not a paperwork problem. It is the reason the control never reached the deck.

The template

A Word file from a job in 2019, with the site name changed and the hazards left alone.

Generic by the time it lands

The briefing

Read out at the gate to eleven men, four of whom arrived after it finished.

Nobody can say who heard it

The signature sheet

On a clipboard in the cabin. Filled in on Thursday for a job that started Monday.

Signed three days late

The revision

Issued by email on Tuesday. Half the gang is working to the version they signed.

Two live documents

The subcontractor's

Emailed in as a PDF, saved to a folder, never matched against anybody's name.

Held, not evidenced

The inspector asks

Who accepted this, on what date, and against which version of the document.

The one question a folder cannot answer

The underlying issue The document is not the control. The briefing is And the briefing is what goes unrecorded

Risk assessmentMethod statementHazards and controlsResidual riskPPE40-odd by tradeYour templates importedSigned on the phoneAt the gateAgainst a frozen versionFiled on the jobDynamic risk assessmentSubbie operatives sign tooAppend-only audit trailInto the CDM fileReg 15(2) Risk assessmentMethod statementHazards and controlsResidual riskPPE40-odd by tradeYour templates importedSigned on the phoneAt the gateAgainst a frozen versionFiled on the jobDynamic risk assessmentSubbie operatives sign tooAppend-only audit trailInto the CDM fileReg 15(2)

What the module does

Six things a folder of PDFs cannot.

Pulled by trade
at clock-in

The QR punch knows who has arrived and what trade they are. Today's RAMS for that trade comes up on the phone before the work does, rather than waiting to be handed out.

Scroll, sign, and the system stamps the record
About two minutes for a gang of twenty-two
The man who arrives at ten signs at ten
Not caught up on a sheet three days later

Delivered, not distributedLive

Signed against
a frozen version

A RAMS freezes on submission. Amending it means a new version, so a signature is always against a specific document on a specific date rather than against whatever the file says today.

Which is the question an inspector actually asks
Revisions cannot rewrite what somebody already accepted
The old version stays readable, with its own signatures
Two live documents stop being possible

Version, name and dateLive

Forty-odd starters,
then your own

A library of around forty RAMS by trade ships with the platform, which most firms pick from on day one and tailor in week two. Your existing templates are imported as part of onboarding at no charge.

Hazards, controls, residual risk and PPE per task
You own your templates and can export them at any time
So the starter library is a floor, not a ceiling
No rewriting a document set you already trust

Yours, imported freeLive

Everyone on the
gate, not just staff

The register records each signatory's own company as free text, so a subcontractor's operatives, agency labour and visitors sign the same RAMS as your directly employed people, without needing a staff record first.

Subbie operatives sign at no extra cost, the fee is per firm
Which is the deciding point on a fit-out site
One register for the job, not one per employer
The audit trail covers the gate, not the payroll

Per firm, not per headLive

Dynamic risk
assessment on site

When conditions change, the supervisor records the reassessment where the work is, against the same job, rather than deciding to do it and writing nothing down.

The weather, the sequence, the plant that did not turn up
Photographs attach to the assessment they belong to
So a changed method has a record, not just a decision
Which is the gap most incident investigations land in

Recorded where it happensLive

Into the CDM file,
as the job runs

RAMS sit against the project with the permits, the toolbox talks, the diary and the plant records, so the health and safety evidence is assembled by the work rather than reconstructed for the handover.

Exported as one PDF for the client or principal designer
Every event logged with user, device, IP and timestamp
Append-only, so the log is not editable afterwards
Assembling the file itself stays a duty holder job

Generated, not reconstructedLive

Ask who signed the current revision of your highest-risk RAMS.

Not who was sent it, and not who was on site that week. Who accepted that version, on what date. It is one question, and it is the one an inspector opens with.

Book a demo → 30 minutes. Bring a real RAMS and we will load it.

Where it matters

The four moments a RAMS is actually read.

It is ignored the rest of the time, which is precisely why the record has to be right without anybody maintaining it.

At the gate, before the work

The only moment that changes an outcome. Everything after it is evidence about a decision already taken, which is why the sign-off happening at the start of the shift rather than on a clipboard later is the whole point of the module rather than a convenience.

When the method changes

The excavation is wetter than the survey said, the crane is off the road, the sequence moves. A reassessment made and not recorded looks identical afterwards to one never made at all, and the difference only becomes visible when somebody is hurt.

At pre-qualification

A main contractor or an SSIP scheme asks for sample RAMS and evidence they are briefed. Exported from the live record, what they receive is what you hold. The reformatted version is where a document set starts diverging from the one in use.

After an incident

The question is whether the person doing the work had been briefed on the controls for that task, and the answer has to carry a name, a version and a date. This is the moment a signature captured at the point of delivery stops being administration.

Where CDM 2015 puts the duty

Under Reg 15(2) a contractor must plan, manage and monitor its own work so that it is carried out without risks to health and safety so far as is reasonably practicable. The duty to assess the risk itself sits in reg 3 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. CDM does not name RAMS as a document; RAMS are how the industry discharges both. There is more in the CDM 2015 guide, and the duties are listed on the CDM checklist.

What it does not do

It does not write your risk assessment, and it does not decide whether a control is adequate. It will not stop work starting where nobody has signed; the control is visibility and an audit trail, not a hard block on the gate. If you want an unsigned RAMS to prevent an allocation outright, raise it at implementation and it can be discussed as a rule for your setup.

The RAMS is one of five things signed on the same phone.

Permits to work, toolbox talks, dynamic risk assessments and near-miss reports run through the same register, against the same project, with the same audit trail.

See the whole module → Or call the office on UK hours

Questions

Asked by whoever
signs the RAMS off.

What does RAMS stand for?+

Risk assessment and method statement. The risk assessment identifies the hazards in a task, who might be harmed, the controls applied and the risk that remains once they are. The method statement describes how the work will actually be done, in sequence, with the plant, permits, PPE and people it requires. They are two documents that are almost always issued and signed as one, which is where the initialism comes from.

Are RAMS a legal requirement in the UK?+

The initialism is not named in any regulation. The duties behind it are. Regulation 3 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 requires a suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks, and requires it to be recorded where you employ five or more people. Under CDM 2015 Reg 15(2) a contractor must plan, manage and monitor its own work so that it is carried out without risks to health and safety so far as is reasonably practicable. RAMS are the document set the industry uses to discharge both, and a principal contractor will require them whether or not the law names them. How the duties apply to your work is a question for your own adviser rather than for us.

Can we bring our own RAMS templates?+

Yes, and they are imported as part of onboarding at no charge. We also ship a library of around forty starter RAMS by trade, which most firms pick from on day one and tailor in week two. You own your own templates throughout and can export them at any time, so nothing about adopting the module makes your document set harder to take elsewhere.

How does an operative actually sign one?+

On their phone, at the start of the shift. The QR clock-in identifies who has arrived and pulls the RAMS for their trade on that job. They scroll it and sign on the screen, and the system stamps the record with the person, the version and the time. For a gang of twenty-two this takes about two minutes at the gate. There is no clipboard sheet, and no signature added afterwards by somebody who was not in the room.

What happens when a RAMS is revised mid-job?+

A RAMS freezes on submission, so amending it produces a new version rather than editing the one people have already accepted. Signatures stay attached to the version they were given, and the earlier version remains readable with its own signatures against it. That is deliberate: the alternative quietly rewrites what somebody agreed to, and the question after an incident is always which document a named person accepted on a named date.

Can subcontractors and agency labour sign?+

Yes, and it costs nothing extra, because the fee is per firm rather than per person. The register records each signatory's own company as free text rather than requiring a staff record, so a subcontractor's operatives, agency labour and visitors all sign the same RAMS as your directly employed people. On a fit-out site where most of the labour belongs to somebody else, this is usually the deciding point. Subcontract firms' own certificates and insurances live on the subcontractor portal.

Does it work without a signal?+

The field app is built for sites rather than for offices, and sign-off is one scroll and a finger swipe by design. Where coverage is genuinely absent for long periods, that is worth raising at implementation against your actual sites rather than taking a general assurance from us, because the honest answer depends on which of your jobs you mean.

Will it stop work if nobody has signed?+

No, and be wary of anyone who says their software does. What it gives you is visibility before the fact and an append-only record afterwards: who has signed, who has not, and against which version. Whether an unsigned RAMS should hard-block an allocation is a rule worth settling at implementation for your setup. The duty to make sure the work is planned, managed and monitored stays with the duty holder.

How does this feed the CDM health and safety file?+

RAMS sit against the project alongside the construction phase plan, permits, toolbox talks, RIDDOR records, the training matrix, welfare confirmations and plant compliance, and that evidence exports as one PDF for the client or principal designer at handover. Unibuild holds and organises what goes into the file. Preparing the file itself remains the duty holder's job, and the CDM checklist sets out which duties produce which document.

What is the difference between a RAMS and a permit to work?+

A RAMS covers a task and lasts as long as the task does. A permit authorises a specific high-risk activity for a specific window and is closed out at the end of it, which is why hot work, work at height, ladders, steps and lone working each have their own. They sit together on the same module and are signed on the same phone, and a method statement will frequently require a permit as one of its controls. The permits are described on the health and safety module.

Is a signature captured on a phone worth anything?+

What we can tell you is what the system records and what it will not let anybody change. Every event, whether a sign-off, an edit or a status change, writes an entry carrying the user, the device, the IP address and the timestamp, and the log is append-only rather than editable. A signature is always against a specific version on a specific date. What weight that carries in a particular proceeding is not ours to promise, and you should be sceptical of a supplier who tells you otherwise.

Does a good RAMS come out of the software?+

No. The module makes sure the document reaches the people doing the work and that the acceptance is recorded; it does not make a generic assessment specific, and a generic assessment delivered perfectly is still generic. What separates a RAMS that stands up from one that merely exists is a separate question and worth answering before you write the next one, which is what RAMS that hold up is about.

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