The compliance documents every UK contractor needs to win work and pass CHAS (2026)

Most contractors do not lose work because they are bad at the job. They lose it because a main contractor or an SSIP assessor asks for a document they have not got, or sends back the one they submitted because it was an obvious template with the company name dropped in. The paperwork is not the work, but on a managed site it is the thing that decides whether you get through the gate. This guide sets out every health and safety document a UK contractor is realistically asked for, what each one has to contain to be accepted, and why the generic version fails. It is grounded in the actual CHAS and SSIP assessment criteria, not a generic checklist.

Why these documents exist

A main contractor wants to work with trades who know what they are doing. The trouble is they cannot watch you work, and they are taking you at your word before you have lifted a tool. So they do the next best thing: they check your paperwork. Your documents are the evidence that you understand your risks, manage them properly, and have done it before. That is what the policy, the RAMS, the training records and the rest are actually for. They are proof of competence to someone who has not seen you on site.

And there is a hard reason they care. If you hurt someone on their site, the liability runs up the chain to them. A main contractor who let an unvetted contractor through the gate is the one answering to the HSE and carrying the legal and financial fallout. So when they ask for your documents, they are not box-ticking. They are protecting themselves, and they will only let on the trades who can prove on paper that they are safe to work with. SSIP, the Safety Schemes in Procurement umbrella formed in 2009 to stop every contractor being assessed ten different ways, sets the core criteria that CHAS, SMAS and the other schemes assess you against. Pass it once and you have the proof main contractors are looking for.

1. Health and safety policy

A written statement of how your business manages health and safety. For any business with five or more employees, having it in writing is a legal requirement under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.

What it must contain to be accepted: three parts. A statement of intent signed and dated by your most senior person within the last twelve months. A section setting out who is responsible for what, by name or role. And an arrangements section covering how you actually handle the day to day: accident reporting including RIDDOR, first aid, training, risk assessment, communication, emergency procedures, and the hazards specific to your trade such as asbestos where relevant.

Why the generic one fails: an unedited template is the single most common rejection. Assessors and main contractors spot a downloaded policy instantly, because the arrangements describe a generic business rather than yours and the statement of intent is unsigned or signed by the wrong person. The policy has to be in your company name, reflect your actual trades, and carry a real signature from the top of the business, dated within the last year.

2. Risk assessments and method statements (RAMS)

The risk assessment identifies what could hurt someone on a particular job and what you are doing about it. The method statement sets out, step by step, how the work will be done safely. Together they are RAMS, and they are the document a main contractor asks for more than any other.

What it must contain to be accepted: the hazards specific to the actual task and site, not a generic list. The people at risk. The control measures you will use, in enough detail that someone could follow them. And a method statement that walks through the job in sequence. SSIP assessors want to see site or project specific risk assessments created within the last twelve months, not a single dusty document reused for every job.

Why the generic one fails: a RAMS clearly downloaded from the internet and not adapted to the work is an instant rejection, and it is the problem assessors complain about most. A scaffolding RAMS that does not mention your actual scaffold, or a roofing RAMS with no fragile surface controls, tells the reader you have not thought about the job. The fix is RAMS that describe the real task, produced from genuine trade knowledge.

3. COSHH assessments

A COSHH assessment controls the substances on your job that can harm health, under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002. You need one whenever hazardous substances are used or created by your work, and most trades create them without thinking: paints, solvents, adhesives, cement, fuels, oils, and the dust and fumes thrown off by cutting, grinding and mixing.

What it must contain to be accepted: the substance, the harm it can do, who is exposed and how, and the controls that bring the risk down, from ventilation and extraction to RPE and safe storage. CHAS and SSIP assessors expect COSHH assessments covering the substances relevant to the work you actually do.

Why the generic one fails: a COSHH assessment that lists substances you do not use, or misses the dust your work plainly creates, shows it was not written for you. Silica dust from cutting block and stone is the obvious one trades leave out, and it is the one that does the most long term harm.

4. Site inductions

The induction is how everyone who sets foot on a site is told the things that keep them safe before they start: the site rules, the hazards, where welfare and first aid are, what to do in an emergency, and who is in charge. On a managed site the induction is mandatory, and the main contractor will expect you to induct your own people and to have a record that you did.

What it must contain to be accepted: the site specific information, not a generic safety lecture. The actual hazards on this site, the actual rules, the actual emergency arrangements, and a signature from each person inducted to prove they received it. SSIP assessors look for an induction process with sample forms and a record of who has been inducted.

Why the generic one fails: an induction that could be for any site tells a worker nothing useful and tells an assessor you are going through the motions. It has to carry the real detail for the place people are actually working, and it has to be signed.

5. Toolbox talks

Short, regular safety briefings on a single topic, delivered to the crew on site. They are how you keep safety live between the big documents, and they are how you show an assessor that health and safety is something you do every week, not something that sits in a folder.

What it must contain to be accepted: a clear topic relevant to the work, a record of the date, and the signatures of everyone who attended. CHAS and SSIP submissions want a toolbox talk procedure and copies of recent sessions with the register.

Why the generic one fails: talks with no register, or topics that have nothing to do with the work in front of the crew, do not count. The value is in picking the right subject for the job and proving the crew were there.

6. Accident reporting and RIDDOR records

Every business with employees has to report and record accidents under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013 (RIDDOR). This is both a documented procedure and the records themselves.

What it must contain to be accepted: a written procedure for recording and reporting accidents, including which ones are RIDDOR reportable and who is responsible for reporting them. Records of all RIDDOR reportable and other incidents for at least the last three years, with the remedial action taken after each. And your accident statistics for those three years broken down the way SSIP asks: fatalities, specified injuries, over seven day injuries and reportable cases of ill health.

Why the generic one fails: the common mistakes are having no written procedure at all, or treating a clean record as a problem. It is not. Assessors do not penalise small accidents that were handled and investigated properly. They penalise hiding them, or not being able to show what you changed afterwards. If you genuinely have had no accidents, a one line statement saying so is the right answer.

7. Training records and the training matrix

The evidence that the people doing the work are qualified to do it. A training matrix is simply a grid of who holds what, and when it expires, sitting on top of the certificates themselves.

What it must contain to be accepted: the individual qualifications and cards your trade requires, mapped to the people who hold them, with the certificates to back them up and a view of what is due to expire. For most site trades this means CSCS or the trade equivalent, plus the specific tickets the work needs.

Why the generic one fails: the problem here is rarely the format and usually the gaps: expired cards, missing certificates, or a matrix that does not match the people actually on site. Keeping it current is the whole job.

The supporting policies

Beyond the core documents, a full SSIP submission and many main contractor PQQs ask for a set of shorter policies that show your business is run properly. A drug and alcohol policy setting out your stance and how it is enforced. Occupational health arrangements showing how you raise awareness of issues like dust, vibration and mental health and how workers access support. And, increasingly on tenders, environmental and quality policies. None of these are long, but all of them have to be in your company name and reflect how you actually operate, and a missing one can hold up an otherwise strong application.

How Complys produces these for you

The reason this paperwork is such a drag is that it is repetitive, it has to be specific to your trade, and it goes stale. Complys exists to take that load off a trades business. It generates the documents above from your own trade and details, so you get something written for your business rather than a template you have to fight with.

You can build trade specific RAMS in minutes, generate a health and safety policy that carries your statement of intent and a real signature, produce COSHH assessments for the substances your work involves, create site inductions with the real detail and a sign off, and run toolbox talks with a register that records who attended. You can keep your training records and certificate expiries in one place, and review a subcontractor's RAMS in seconds rather than reading them line by line. When a main contractor asks for your compliance pack, it is one link rather than a week of digging through email.

The point is not to produce paper for its own sake. It is to let you walk into an SSIP assessment or a main contractor's pre-qualification with every document they ask for, written for your business, current, and ready to share, without paying a consultant several hundred pounds to assemble it or losing your evenings to it. The work is still yours. The paperwork does not have to be.