How do you write a site diary that proves who supervised the work in Puntland?

A site diary proves supervision when one named person writes in a bound book every working day, records the specific check made, signs and dates the entry, and stores the book so pages cannot be added or removed later. The Puntland check is simple: ask who holds the book today.

Who should hold the site diary?

The person who actually watches the work each day should hold it: the site supervisor, foreman or clerk of works named in the contract. A diary kept by the office and filled in before a payment claim records intentions, not supervision. Ask the municipal engineer's office which roles it expects on a project of the size, then confirm the name against the contract.

Keep one book per site. If two people supervise different trades, either write both names and let each sign their own entries, or keep separate section books and cross-reference them. Photographs and phone notes help, but they need a date and a person attached. Photographs also sit outside the book, so a disputed entry cannot be checked against a page that never existed.

What does a supervision entry need to record?

Each entry needs the date, the weather, the work done, the check made, who made it and what happened next. "Inspected formwork before pour, cover to reinforcement checked against the drawing, approved to pour at 09:40" tells a reader the check happened. "Work going well" tells them nothing.

Match the entry to the stage: setting out checked against the drawing, cover checked before a pour, blockwork plumb checked by level, concrete cube samples taken and labelled, delivery notes matched to cement bags. Record the tool or instrument used, because a level check and a tape check are different evidence. Where a test result is awaited, note who will bring it and when.

The diary also carries skills evidence. Write down who tied the steel, who operated the mixer and who was being shown how, with the supervisor's name against it. For anything you cannot read off the page, the construction risk analyzer helps flag a documentation gap before it reaches a payment claim. See also people and skills for the training side of the same record.

How do you keep the diary usable when staff change?

A diary survives staff change when the incoming supervisor reads the last two weeks of entries, signs a handover line and continues in the same book. New handwriting in the same numbered sequence shows continuity. A fresh book every few months shows the opposite.

Store the book in the site office when work is running, then move completed books off site, for example to the contractor's office or a locked cabinet at the client's address. Keep a scanned copy if a phone or scanner is available, but treat the paper as the primary record. When the job finishes, hand the books over with the as-built drawings and test results, and list them in the handover note.

The same discipline covers apprentice supervision, which is where records go thin. Write the trainee's name, the task, the supervisor who watched it and whether it was signed off as competent. The question of who supervises apprentices on a building site sits behind half the disputes about defective work, and a diary entry answers it without argument.

What to do next

Buy a bound, numbered A5 or A4 book before the next pour, write the project name, client and site supervisor on the first page, and start today's entry. Ask two suppliers for a written price on the books and store one spare on site. Then agree with the client, in the contract or by letter, that the diary forms part of the handover record.