Your licence is the business, and it is reviewed on your records.
Every job notified and waited on. A plan of work per site. Medicals, face fit tests and RPE examinations per person, each on its own clock. Air monitoring, four stage clearance and consignment notes for everything that leaves. Nobody in construction carries more evidence per pound of turnover. Around thirty modules on one account, and a licensed contractor turns on the handful it needs.
Insulation, coating, board, cement or soils: the material differs, the office side does not.
The removal is the part a licensed contractor already has right. It is the record behind it that decides whether the licence is renewed for three years or one: which jobs were notified and when, whether every person on the enclosure had a current medical and a face fit for the mask they wore, whether the RPE was examined, and where every consignment went.
Unibuild is construction management software for UK contractors, built inside a contracting business rather than sold into one. One account carries the labour run, plant and equipment registers, certification and training records, documents, day works, variations and applications for payment. It is not an asbestos management system and does not replace one; the honest limits at the foot say exactly where the line falls.
Built for licensed work
What licensed removal requires, and what Unibuild provides.
A refurbishment job and a licensed removal look alike in a database. They stop looking alike at the notification, at the medical, and at the clearance certificate. Each requirement below is followed by what the platform does about it.
The tradeThe platform
Notified, then waited on
The job cannot start for fourteen days
Licensed work is notified to the enforcing authority in advance, and the notice period is a hard programme constraint that clients rarely understand.
Notification goes in before work starts, with a statutory waiting period
A change of dates or scope can mean re-notifying
The plan of work is prepared for the specific job and kept on site
A job that slips two weeks takes the notification with it
The dates held against the job and watched overnight
Notification references, submission dates and earliest start dates are held against the job as dated documents, and the reminders engine checks them overnight. Nothing is submitted to the enforcing authority; the notification goes through their own system as it does now.
Competence here is not one card. It is a medical, a face fit for the specific mask, current training and an examined piece of RPE, each expiring separately.
Medical examinations for licensed work are required at least every two years
Face fit testing is per person and per make and model of mask
Training is refreshed annually and is specific to licensed work
RPE is examined and the examination is recorded
Four clocks per person, in one grid that colours itself
The training matrix holds the medical, the face fit per mask, the training and the RPE examination against the person, each with its own date, turning amber before it lapses. The labour run reads the same account, so a crew is built from people who are actually clear to work.
Your equipment register is a life support register
Negative pressure units, RPE, air lines and decontamination units are not plant in the ordinary sense. They are the controls, and they carry their own examinations.
Negative pressure units carry a thorough examination at least every six months
RPE is examined and maintained on a defined interval
Decontamination units need servicing, water heating and their own records
A unit out of date stops the enclosure, not just the machine
One expiry page for the kit that makes the job legal
Every unit, mask, air line and decontamination unit is its own record with serial, service history and next examination date, watched on the same page as the vehicles. Scanning the item at the depot returns its history before it goes on a wagon.
Asbestos waste is hazardous waste, carried by a registered carrier under a consignment note to a site permitted to take it.
Consignment notes carry a code and identify producer, carrier and consignee
Records are kept for a defined period after the movement
Double bagging, labelling and the route out of the enclosure all matter
A missing note is a duty you cannot evidence, years later
The note photographed against the job as the wagon leaves
Loads out are recorded against the job on the phone with the carrier, the consignee, the code and a photograph of the note, so the evidence is captured at the kerb rather than filed later. See waste transfer notes for the paperwork itself.
A licence is granted for a period and reviewed, and the review looks at how the firm actually operated rather than at what its policies say.
A three year licence can become one year on a poor assessment
Assessors sample jobs and ask for the records behind them
Health records for employees are kept for forty years
Losing the licence ends the business, not a contract
Any job retrieved with everything attached to it
Notification, plan of work, crew and their dates, equipment used, air monitoring results, clearance certificate and consignment notes all hang off one job record. An assessor's sample becomes a lookup rather than a fortnight assembling folders from four filing cabinets.
Working in full RPE and coveralls is physically limited, and the wearing periods, breaks and decontamination cycles shape the shift.
Continuous wear of RPE is limited, with breaks built into the plan
Heat stress inside an enclosure is a real and immediate risk
Decontamination adds unproductive time at both ends of every entry
Out of hours work in occupied buildings is common and adds night shifts
Hours recorded at the unit, counted against your limits
Hours come off a scan at the decontamination unit, timed by the server. Advanced Fatigue Manager counts shift length, travel at both ends, rest between turns and consecutive nights against the limits you set. Wearing periods inside the enclosure stay a supervisor's judgement.
Counted in the deployment Unibuild was built on, July 2026: one expiry page carrying 376 assets, 141 subcontractor certificates, 84 accreditations, 80 health assessments, 55 instruments and 9 vehicles.
Insulation and lagging
Board and panel
Cement and soils
Enclosures
Decontamination
RPE and air
Monitoring and clearance
Notifications and records
The week
An ordinary week in a licensed contractor, and the record it leaves.
Six entries from a licensed asbestos contractor's day book. Nothing here asks anybody to remember something at the end of a shift in a decontamination unit.
Monday, the crew
Next week's enclosure is crewed from people whose medical, face fit and refresher training are all current. One face fit expires on the Wednesday and the person is swapped before the notification goes in.
Caught before the notice
Tuesday, the notice
The notification reference and the earliest start date go on the job. Two weeks of programme now exist as a date something is watching rather than as a note on a wall planner.
On the clock, visibly
At the depot
Negative pressure units are scanned before they are loaded. One is a week from its six monthly examination and is swapped for a unit that will still be in date at the end of the job.
Swapped, not discovered
Wednesday, the shift
Operatives scan in at the decontamination unit. Hours land against the job, and the fatigue record picks up a crew on its fourth consecutive night in an occupied building.
Warned in time
The wagon
Nine consignments leave for the permitted site. Each note is photographed against the job with its carrier and consignee as the wagon pulls off.
Evidenced at the kerb
The assessment
A licence assessor samples three jobs from the last eighteen months. Each one returns its notification, plan, crew, equipment, clearance and consignment notes from one record.
Produced in the room
The test
Eight things asbestos software has to do.
Written from what actually costs a licensed contractor money or exposes it, rather than from a feature list. Unibuild is around thirty modules on one account, and a licensed firm turns on a handful of them.
Four separate clocks per person, not one card
The training matrix holds the medical, the face fit per make and model of mask, the annual refresher and the RPE examination against each person, each with its own date, in a grid that turns amber before a date passes. A single expiry per person is the wrong shape for this trade, because the four expire independently and any one of them stops that person working.
Notification dates watched by something that does not forget
Reminders and expiry holds the notification reference, the submission date and the earliest start against the job and checks overnight. Nothing is submitted to the enforcing authority through the platform, which the honest limits below repeat, but the fourteen day constraint stops being a fact somebody remembers.
Life support equipment on its own examination register
Negative pressure units, RPE, air lines and decontamination units are records with serials, service history and next examination dates, on the same page as the vehicles. Six monthly examinations on negative pressure units and RPE examinations run on their own intervals rather than as one fleet date, and scanning the item at the depot returns it.
Every job retrievable whole, eighteen months later
Notification, plan of work, crew with their dates, equipment used, air monitoring results, clearance certificate and consignment notes all hang off one job record. A licence assessment is a sample of jobs and a request for what sat behind them, so the shape of the record decides whether that is a lookup or a fortnight.
Consignment notes captured where the wagon is
Loads out are recorded against the job on the phone with the carrier, the consignee, the code and a photograph of the note. With no compound to store anything, the note is captured at the kerb or it is captured badly. Related: waste transfer notes.
Hours that survive a run of nights in an occupied building
QR clock-in timesheets put the hours against the job at the decontamination unit, timed by the server. Advanced Fatigue Manager counts consecutive nights, rest between turns and travel at both ends against your limits. Out of hours work in live buildings is the norm in this trade, and the hours it generates reach no weekly total.
Health records that outlive the employment
Health records for employees exposed to asbestos are kept for forty years, which is longer than most companies last and far longer than most systems. Records are held against the person on the HR record and export in full, because a record you cannot get out is not a record you have kept.
Subcontract labour held to the same standard
Subcontractor management holds insurances, licences and accreditations per firm, and a lapse removes that firm from approved status overnight. Agency operatives scan the same unit as your own people, so they appear on the attendance record, the fatigue record and the job record for the enclosure they were actually on.
Governing clauseEverything above is a record made at the unit, not assembled for the assessor.
The depot
What a licensed contractor holds
Written for the trade rather than for any one firm. Most licensed contractors will recognise eight or nine of these lines and ignore the rest.
What a UK licensed asbestos removal contractor holds, and the tracking quirk in each line
Key
Category
Typical items
The tracking quirk
RPE
Full face masks, powered respirators, air fed hoods, filters
Face fit is per person and per make and model, so a mask and a person are a pair rather than two separate records
Negative pressure units
NPUs, pre-filters, HEPA filters, ducting, smoke test kit
Carries a thorough examination at least every six months, and a unit out of date stops the enclosure rather than the machine
Decontamination units
Mobile DCUs, static units, water heaters, transit hulls, generators
A vehicle, a welfare facility and a control all at once, so it carries MOT, service and examination dates simultaneously
Mundane items whose absence stops a licensed job, ordered per enclosure rather than per month
Waste packaging
Red and clear bags, UN approved drums, wrap, labels, consignment notes
The packaging is part of the legal duty rather than a container, and the note that accompanies it is the evidence
Small plant
H type vacuums, water pumps, lighting, transformers, hand tools
An H type vacuum is a control rather than a tool, with its own service requirement and a filter change nobody logs
Monitoring equipment
Air pumps, flow meters, smoke generators, DOP test kit
Measuring instruments with calibration dates, and a lapsed one puts every reading it took in question
Transport
Waste vehicles, crew vans, DCU tow vehicles, trailers
Waste vehicles carry a carrier registration as well as an MOT, and the registration expires on its own timetable
People
Operatives, supervisors, managers, analysts where employed
Each carries four separate dates (medical, face fit, training, RPE) and any one of them lapsing stops that person working
Analytical services
Air monitoring, four stage clearance, bulk sampling, site reports
Carried out by an independent accredited body, so the certificate is somebody else's document that has to live on your job
The paperwork
Licence, notifications, plans of work, clearances, consignment notes
The only category with no physical existence and the one the licence itself is renewed on, so it is the one worth systemising first
Regulations
The regimes a licensed contractor works under
It is about who was medically cleared, what mask they were fitted for, whether the unit was examined, and where every bag went. This is the reference version, kept factual.
The regimes a UK licensed asbestos removal contractor works under, and what each requires
Regime
What it requires
Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012
The governing regulations. Most work with asbestos insulation, insulating board and coating requires a licence from HSE, granted for a period and reviewed. Licensed work must be notified in advance, carried out under a written plan of work kept at the site, with air monitoring, decontamination, and clearance before reoccupation. Non-licensed and notifiable non-licensed work sit under the same regulations with lighter but still substantial duties.
Notification and the waiting period
Licensed work is notified to the relevant enforcing authority before it starts, and there is a statutory waiting period between the notification and the start of work. A material change to the dates, the location or the scope can mean the notification no longer covers the job. For a contractor this is a programme constraint clients consistently underestimate.
Medical surveillance
Employees carrying out licensed work undergo a medical examination at intervals set by the regulations, and the employer keeps a health record. Health records are retained for forty years, which outlasts most employment and most software. A lapsed medical stops that individual working on licensed work, with no discretion available.
Face fit testing and RPE
Respiratory protective equipment must fit the wearer, which is established by a face fit test specific to the person and to the make and model of mask. Facial hair defeats a tight fitting mask. RPE is maintained and examined, and the examinations are recorded. Three separate dates therefore attach to one person wearing one mask.
Training
Training for licensed work is specific, and refresher training is expected annually. It is separate from the general asbestos awareness training that other trades receive, and separate again from supervisor and manager level training. Records of who was trained, when, and to what level are part of what a licence assessment examines.
LOLER and PUWER on control equipment
Negative pressure units and other equipment carry thorough examination and inspection duties, commonly at six monthly intervals for the units that make an enclosure work. These are not ordinary plant items: the examination is what allows the enclosure to be used, so an out of date unit stops the job rather than inconveniences it.
Hazardous waste and consignment notes
Asbestos waste is hazardous waste. It is double bagged and labelled, carried by a registered waste carrier under a consignment note bearing a code identifying producer, carrier and consignee, and taken to a site permitted to receive it. Records are kept for the required period, and a movement without its note is a duty that cannot be evidenced. See waste transfer notes.
Four stage clearance and reoccupation
Before an enclosure is dismantled and the area reoccupied, an independent accredited analyst carries out a four stage clearance covering a site condition check, a thorough visual inspection, air monitoring and a final assessment after dismantling. The certificate is issued by that analyst rather than by you, and it belongs on the job record alongside everything else.
CDM 2015
Licensed removal on a construction project is construction work, and the contractor duties to plan, manage and monitor apply. Where removal precedes a refurbishment or demolition, the refurbishment and demolition survey governs the whole job, and the plan of work has to agree with the construction phase plan. See the CDM 2015 guide and demolition contractors.
Working time and fatigue
Out of hours work in occupied buildings makes night shifts routine, and time in full RPE and coveralls is physically limited in its own right. The Working Time Regulations 1998 and the general duties in the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 apply alongside the wearing periods in the plan of work. See fatigue management.
On the record
Questions licensed contractors ask
The questions licensed asbestos contractors actually raise on a demonstration, answered on the record. Open one to read the response.
The marketWhat software do UK licensed asbestos contractors use?+
Most run a combination: a specialist asbestos management package for surveys, registers and sometimes plans of work, the enforcing authority's own notification system, a spreadsheet for crews and their four dates, and an accounts package behind it. Unibuild sits on the contractor's own side of that: people, competence, equipment examinations, site records, waste movements and the money. It is not an asbestos management system and does not survey, register or notify.
NotificationDoes it submit notifications to HSE?+
No, and nothing here should pretend otherwise. Notifications go through the enforcing authority's own system and this does not replace it. What Unibuild does is hold the reference, the submission date and the earliest start date against the job as dated documents, and watch those dates overnight so the waiting period is visible on the programme rather than remembered by one person in the office.
CompetenceCan it hold medicals, face fit, training and RPE separately per person?+
Yes, and separately is the only useful way. Four dates attach to one person, they expire independently, and any one of them lapsing stops that individual working on licensed work. Face fit is held per make and model of mask rather than as a single pass, because that is what the test actually establishes. The grid turns amber before a date passes, and the crew planner reads the same account.
EquipmentWill it watch negative pressure unit examinations?+
Yes, on the same expiry page as the vehicles and the vacuums. Each unit is its own record with serial, service history and next examination date, and scanning it at the depot returns its history before it goes on a wagon. For a six week enclosure the useful question is not whether it is in date today but whether it will still be in date at clearance, which is what the page is for.
LicenceWill it help at a licence assessment?+
It will make the sample retrievable, which is most of the battle. An assessor picks jobs and asks for what sat behind them, and here the notification, plan, crew with their dates, equipment used, clearance certificate and consignment notes all hang off one job record. It does not prepare you, argue your case or guarantee an outcome. What changes is that producing the evidence stops being a fortnight of assembling folders.
WasteCan it track consignment notes?+
Yes, as movements recorded against the job on the phone with the carrier, the consignee, the code and a photograph of the note, captured as the wagon leaves. It does not file anything with the environmental regulator, does not classify waste and does not check that a consignee is permitted to receive what you are sending. Those stay your decisions, and the record is evidence that you made them.
AnalystsThe clearance certificate comes from an independent analyst. Where does it go?+
On the job record, alongside the air monitoring results and everything else. It is somebody else's document, produced by an accredited body that must be independent of you, and that independence is the point of it. What Unibuild does is stop that certificate living in an email thread, so eighteen months later it is attached to the enclosure it cleared rather than searchable by the analyst's filename.
Health recordsHealth records have to be kept for forty years. Can you do that?+
Records are held against the person and export in full at any time, which is the honest answer to a forty year duty. No software vendor can credibly promise four decades, and one that does is not being straight with you. What matters is that you can always get the complete record out in a usable form, which is why the cancellation policy gives three months of full access and a clean dataset within five working days.
FatigueWe work nights in occupied buildings. Does it help with hours?+
Yes. Hours come off a scan at the decontamination unit, timed by the server, and Advanced Fatigue Manager counts consecutive nights, rest between turns and travel at both ends against the limits you set, warning before the shift. What it does not do is manage wearing periods inside the enclosure; those are shorter, governed by the plan of work, and stay with the supervisor.
AdoptionWill operatives use it in the enclosure?+
They should not be trying to, and nothing here asks them to. A phone does not go into an enclosure and does not come out of one without decontamination. The realistic pattern is clock in at the unit, the plan of work signature before entry, and photographs and waste records taken outside by the supervisor. Everything else stays with the office. Permissions are granted per person, so that is a configuration rather than a compromise.
PricingWe are a small firm. Is this proportionate?+
Licensed contractors are mostly small firms carrying a compliance burden the size of a much larger business, which is exactly the gap this is priced against. Users are unlimited, there is no charge per job or per asset, and there is no published rate card because a fifteen person licensed firm and a hundred person one are not the same product. Pricing is worked out on the demonstration and fixed for three years.
RolloutWhere do most firms start?+
With people and equipment, because that is where a lapsed date stops work. The four dates per person and the examination dates on the units are the two registers that pay for themselves first. Jobs, waste movements and the money follow once the first is habit. Firms go live in stages and migration of your existing people and equipment records is done for you.
Five things a licensed contractor asks for that are not in the platform as it stands. Unibuild is bespoke, so each one is a scoping conversation rather than a dead end: customer specific modules, fields, rules and reports are written on request and included in the monthly fee.
Notification to the enforcing authorityNothing is submitted. References, dates and the waiting period are held and watched; the notification goes through their own system.
Asbestos registers and survey dataNo survey module, no material or priority assessment scoring, and no building register. That is a specialist package and this does not replace it.
Plans of work as structured dataThe plan is a document against the job with every revision kept. There is no template engine that builds it from the survey.
Air monitoring and clearanceResults and certificates are held against the job. They are produced by an independent accredited analyst, and nothing here analyses anything.
Waste classification and regulator filingConsignment notes are recorded and photographed. Nothing classifies waste, checks a consignee's permit or files with the environmental regulator.
Other trades
Not quite your line of work?
The same platform, written for the trade that runs it. Each of these is a different set of modules switched on rather than a different product.
Return slip
Come and try it on one enclosure.
Half an hour, on your own jobs and your own people. Bring your crew list with their four dates and the units due for examination this quarter, and we will set both up in front of you. Unlimited users, never per seat, and fourteen days to try it without a card.
