Building handover inspection app for facility managers
At practical completion a facility manager inherits a building and everything the builder was meant to hand over with it: as-built drawings, operation and maintenance manuals, warranties, commissioning results, keys and access cards, and a defects list that has to be closed within the defects liability period. A handover audit checks that all of it actually arrived and records what was outstanding on the day, because that list is the facility manager’s leverage.
Built for facility managers running teams of roughly 3–50 inspectors.
Sample Handover documentation pack
An illustrative excerpt. The site, readings and findings are fictional; the layout is yours to set.
Handover documentation pack
Handover documentation and defects — Stage 1
- Project
- Fictional Medical Centre fit-out
- Practical completion
- 30 June 2026
- Audited
- 2 July 2026
| Item | Status on the day | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Mechanical O&M manual | Received; commissioning sheets missing for AHU-2 | Result: Outstanding |
| Fire services as-built drawings | Received, marked as-built | Result: Received |
| Roof membrane warranty | Not provided | Result: Missing |
| Access cards and master keys | 48 cards, 6 keys — matches register | Result: Received |
| Defect D-014: ceiling tile staining, Room 12 | Open | Result: Open |
Fields captured on site
Your firm builds the form in-app, so these are a starting point rather than a fixed schema. Every field is captured on the device, with or without signal, and lands in the handover documentation pack where your template puts it.
Documentation
- Document type
- Received (yes / no / partial)
- Reference or file name
- Comment
Assets and keys
- Asset or key set
- Quantity expected
- Quantity received
- Barcode or tag number
Defects
- Defect number
- Location
- Trade
- Description
- Photo
- Status at handover
- Status at follow-up walk
Standards the report works to
- AS 4000-1997General conditions of contract
- Common source of the practical completion and defects liability terms the audit reports against.
Load the standards you hold into your reference library and the drafted prose is written against them rather than against a general model.
How the handover documentation pack gets built
Capture it once, offline
Your firm builds the building handover audit form in-app — 25 field types, nesting repeatable groups, compound AND/OR visibility rules, reusable modules and calculated fields. Field capture works with no signal: jobs, forms, photos, notes and audio all queue in an idempotent outbox that only clears once the server confirms receipt.
Link it to your buildings, levels and tenancies
Enter buildings, levels and tenancies once, as a register. Every one of your elements, defects and cost lines then points at a stored row rather than a name somebody typed — and the links survive a disconnected device.
Render your own template
The handover documentation pack renders into the Word template you already use — your letterhead, your section order, your clause library — with conditionals, loops over repeats, composable sub-templates and photo grids.
Reviewed before it leaves
You write the review framework: a checklist of what a handover documentation pack must contain, plus the prose standards you would mark a junior against. Link it to a report template and it runs every time that template renders. Each finding comes back graded info, minor or major, quoting the sentence at fault, and a person accepts or dismisses every one.
Because the structured submission behind the report is held too, the review is a comparison rather than a proofread: The narrative calls the roof "fair"; the element register grades it C with a twelve-month cost line against it.
Checks a commercial property framework usually carries
- Every graded defect carries a cost band and a priority
- The make-good schedule and the narrative describe the same condition
- Access and DDA non-compliances cite the clause they fail
- Every photo referenced in the text exists and is captioned
Questions
- Can we scan asset tags during the handover walk?
- Yes. The form has a barcode field that reads common symbologies, so asset tags and key tags can be scanned into the register rather than typed.
- Can the same defects be re-checked at the end of the defects period?
- Defects are stored rows, so a follow-up inspection can list every open defect from handover and record its closure, and the report shows the history of each one.
- Can the builder see the outstanding list?
- The report can be sent as a file or as a password-protected link. There is no builder portal, so the builder does not log in or update items themselves.
What this is not
Worth knowing before you book a demo, so neither of us wastes the half hour.
- Not field-service dispatch. No timesheets, no parts, no inventory. Scheduling exists to get an inspector to a site.
- No signature capture. If your deliverable has to carry a signed sign-off on the artefact itself, this is not the tool yet.
- Field capture is what works offline — jobs, forms, photos, notes and audio. Reports, chat, scheduling and the inbox need a connection.
- No client portal. Reports go out as a file or a password-protected link.
Other commercial property work we cover
- Replacement cost assessmentsInsurance valuation report
- Roof condition surveysRoof survey report
- Signage condition auditsSignage register
- Sinking fund forecast inspectionsMaintenance forecast report
- Water efficiency auditsWater audit report
- Accessibility DDA auditsAccess audit report
- Annual facade inspectionsFacade condition report
- Bank branch auditsBranch standards report
Other disciplines
Rebuild your handover documentation pack in SurveyThanks
Bring the Word template you already send clients. If you are coming off another field-forms tool, a filled report can be uploaded, read field by field, and re-rendered into your template.