How I Use the Contractor Management Template with Customers in Pilla
Contractor management is one of those areas that looks fine on paper until something goes wrong. I've reviewed health and safety management systems in hundreds of businesses, and the pattern repeats: there's a policy somewhere, it says "we use competent contractors," and that's about it. Then a plumber turns up unannounced on a Friday afternoon, nobody checks their insurance, nobody supervises the work, and the next thing you know there's a leak behind a wall that wasn't there before. No record of who did the work or what was agreed.
The policy itself is rarely the problem. The gap is between what's written and what actually happens when someone phones a contractor to fix something urgently. That's what this article covers. I'll walk you through what your contractor management arrangements need to include, give you a ready-made template you can edit for your own operation, and explain the bits that matter when an HSE inspector asks how you manage external workers on your premises.
Key Takeaways
- What is contractor management in health and safety? A contractor management policy sets out how you select competent contractors, what documentation you check before they start, how you supervise their work on site, and how you file records afterwards. It's a core part of your health and safety management system
- Why do you need a contractor management policy? The Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 places a duty on employers to ensure the health and safety of anyone affected by their work, including contractors and anyone affected by contractor activity. The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require you to assess risks and co-ordinate with other employers sharing a workplace. An HSE inspector will want to see that you've thought this through
- How do you set it up in Pilla? Use the knowledge hub template below, edit it to match your operation, and share it with your team through the app so everyone has access and you can track who's read it
- How do you automate the follow-up? Set up Poppi to chase staff who haven't acknowledged the policy and flag when it's due for review
Article Content
Understanding What's Required of You
Contractor management sits inside your broader health and safety management system. Any time you bring someone onto your premises to do work, whether that's servicing equipment, completing fire safety inspections, making repairs, or doing a refurbishment, you're introducing risk. The contractors don't know your site layout. They don't know your emergency procedures. Their work can create hazards your staff weren't expecting. And if something goes wrong, it's your premises and your responsibility.
The legal position is clear. Under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, you have a general duty to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health and safety of people affected by your undertaking. That includes contractors working on your site, your own staff while contractors are present, and visitors or customers who might be affected. The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 add a specific duty to co-ordinate with other employers sharing a workplace and to assess the risks that contractor activity introduces.
In practice, an HSE inspector looking at your contractor management will want to see four things. First, how you select contractors and check they're competent. Second, what documentation you collect and review before work starts. Third, how you plan and supervise contractor work while they're on site. Fourth, how you keep records and review whether your arrangements are working.
Most businesses I work with get the first part roughly right. They use contractors they know, or ones recommended by a manufacturer. Where it falls apart is documentation review, supervision, and record-keeping. Those are the areas that cost you if something goes wrong or if an inspector turns up and starts asking questions.
I ran a consultancy for years before building Pilla, and the contractor incidents I dealt with almost always followed the same pattern: someone was in a rush, proper checks got skipped, and the person supervising the work didn't know what to look for. The policy existed. It just didn't get followed.
Setting It Up as a Knowledge Hub Entry
I've built a contractor management template in Pilla covering contractor selection, documentation requirements, work planning, supervision arrangements, record-keeping, and review. It gives you a structured starting point, but you need to edit it to match how your business actually works.
In the knowledge hub, create a new entry and tag it with "Health and Safety System". Use the same tag across all of your health and safety policies so they are grouped together and Poppi can track them as a set. Assign the entry to all teams so that everyone in the business can access it.
The template is designed to be edited, not just filed. Read through every section. Where it says "Company Name," replace it with your business name. If you don't do refurbishment work, remove that reference. If you have specific contractors you use regularly for equipment servicing, name them. The HSE inspector wants to see that your policy reflects your operation, not that you've copied a generic document and filed it.
34. Contractor Management
Company Name will from to time bring in contractors to maintain/service equipment, make repairs, complete safety inspections on our services and undertake refurbishment work. Company Name understand that bringing contractors to work in our venue presents an additional risk to our workforce, visitors, and clientele. Therefore, we must put safety arrangements in place to manage contractors and their work effectively to reduce risk to a safe level.
These safety arrangements are:
Responsible Persons to identify and plan the selection of suitable, competent contractors by arranging work with industry known contractors, contractors recommended by manufacturers, or entering into an agreement with the manufacturer for service and maintenance of equipment.
Safety inspections of services and fire safety systems or venue refurbishment, where the use of industry known contractors is not reasonably practicable, will be arranged with recommended local contractors who will be asked for copies of their insurance (public & employers liability), risk assessments and method statements for the work planned and details of any trade association or professional body membership they are associated with (which proves their competence has been measured).
Responsible Persons to review the health and safety documentation submitted by the contractor, before engaging the contractor to work in the venue.
Ensure work is planned outside of normal opening times to reduce risk to clientele and duties of employees are managed, so the work of contractors does not impact on their safety.
Plan works so the contractors are greeted by a senior manager, escorted to the area where they will be working, and works are supervised by the member of staff, whilst contractors are on site.
Ensure the employee supervising works have a good knowledge of the venue and the business and has contact with a Responsible Person in the event of a query from a contractor which may affect the business.
Ensure the health and safety documentation submitted by the contractor is kept on file in the event there is an incident, a fault occurs, or it is identified that work completed is not up to the required standard.
Review and monitor Company Name's management of contractors to ensure these safety arrangements remain suitable and sufficient to reduce risk at our venue.
This is a preview of the template. In Pilla, you can edit this to match your business.
What I'd want to see when reviewing this:
The contractor selection section is the foundation. I'd want to see that you're using industry-known contractors where possible, contractors recommended by manufacturers, or entering into service agreements for specialist equipment. For everything else, the template sets out what to ask for: public liability and employers' liability insurance, risk assessments and method statements specific to the planned work, and evidence of trade association or professional body membership. That last one matters more than people think. It proves someone independent has assessed the contractor's competence.
The supervision section is where this policy earns its weight. Contractors should be greeted by a senior manager, escorted to the work area, and supervised by someone with good knowledge of the premises. That person needs a line back to a Responsible Person if questions come up that go beyond their authority. I'd want to see that your policy makes this explicit, not optional.
Common mistakes I see:
The biggest one is collecting documentation without reading it. I've sat with managers who have a folder full of contractor paperwork, and when I ask what the risk assessment says, they can't tell me. The template asks you to review health and safety documentation before engaging a contractor. Review means read, check it's current, check it's specific to the work, and check the insurance hasn't expired. Filing is not reviewing.
The second is poor planning around timing. The template says to plan work outside normal opening times where appropriate. I still see contractors turning up during peak hours because nobody thought to schedule the visit. That puts customers, staff, and the contractors themselves at risk, and it makes proper supervision close to impossible when your team is already stretched.
The third is treating contractor safety as the contractor's problem. You retain responsibility for safety on your premises. If a contractor's method of work is creating a hazard for your staff or visitors, that's your problem to manage. The template covers this through the supervision and review arrangements, but I see businesses skip those sections because they assume the contractor's own risk assessment covers everything.
Automate the Follow-Up with Poppi
Writing the policy is one thing. Making sure your team has actually read it is another. Poppi can handle the chasing so you don't have to.
If you mark the knowledge hub entry as mandatory, Poppi will track who's read it and who hasn't. You can set up automations to chase staff who are behind, notify managers when someone completes the policy, and get a regular report showing where the gaps are.
Here are three automations I'd set up for any knowledge hub policy:
Tom, you have 2 overdue policies to read and acknowledge
Overdue training reminders
Automatically chase team members who have mandatory policies they haven't read yet. Poppi sends the reminder so you don't have to.
Tom, you have 2 overdue policies to read and acknowledge
Emma has completed a mandatory policy
Video completion alerts
Get notified when a team member finishes reading or watching a policy, so you can track progress without chasing.
Emma has completed a mandatory policy
Training Report: 87% team completion. Tom and Sarah behind on 2 mandatory policies, due 3 days ago.
Training gap analysis
Get a regular AI report showing which team members are behind on mandatory policies and where the gaps are across your team.
Training Report: 87% team completion. Tom and Sarah behind on 2 mandatory policies, due 3 days ago.