How to write a construction daily report (free daily report template)

Download the daily report template

Download the daily report template (Excel, .xlsx). No sign-up and no email. It opens in Excel and in Google Sheets: in Google Drive choose New, then File upload, then open the file with Google Sheets.

One file per job, with these tabs:

• Daily Log — one row per day: weather morning and afternoon, high and low, rain or snow, site conditions and hours lost to weather; work performed, deliveries, equipment, inspections and tests, visitors; any delay with its cause, hours lost and the date written notice went out; instructions received and whether they need a change order; safety incidents, photos, and who wrote and signed it. A Check column flags anything missing.
• Manpower — headcount by trade for every day, your crew and every sub.
• Daily Report — pick a date and it lays that day out as a one-page report with signature lines, ready to print or save as a PDF.
• Calendar — every day from the start of work to yesterday, with any workday that has no report marked MISSING.
• Delays — every delay and every instruction pulled into one list, flagging delays with no written notice and changes with no change order.
• Summary, Setup, Checklist and Start Here — weather days used against your contract allowance, hours lost by cause, headcount and safety totals, the settings, and how to use the file.

Blue text is what you type. Black text is a formula. Yellow cells are settings. The file comes with a sample job, a dental office addition, with four weeks of reports including a rain day, a failed inspection, a late delivery, a first aid case and a verbal change from the owner. Its dates are set from today, so the flags keep showing; type your own over them.

What a daily report is for

A daily report is the job’s diary. An article in the American Bar Association’s construction litigation newsletter describes daily reports as providing a diary of what occurred on the project on a given day: what work was performed and where, manpower, supervision, equipment, material deliveries, inclement weather, safety incidents and other notable items. It adds that accuracy and detail are important, because daily reports are often used in litigation. American Bar Association

The same article says one daily report may not tell the whole story: what matters is the trend across them, and whether they are completed each day rather than copied and pasted from the day before. American Bar Association

That is the test to write to. A report written that evening, by the person who was there, is evidence. A week of reports written on Friday from memory is a liability, and a gap in the dates is the day someone later says you were not on site.

What goes in a construction daily report

Federal construction jobs spell it out. The quality control specification used by the Army Corps of Engineers, NAVFAC and the Air Force requires a production report and a quality control report for each day work is performed, delivered to the government by 10:00 am the next working day. The daily report has to cover, among other things: WBDG

• the contractors and subcontractors on site, and what each is responsible for
• equipment, with hours worked, idle or down for repair
• work performed each day, giving location, description and by whom
• tests and inspections, with results
• materials received, and whether they were acceptable
• safety checks, with results and corrective action
• instructions given or received, and conflicts in the plans and specifications

It also asks for the trades working, the number of people working, the weather and any delays. Private jobs rarely say this much, but the list is a good standard for any job: if a report covers all of it, it can answer most questions anyone will ask about that day. WBDG

The template’s Daily Log has a column for each, with headcount by trade on the Manpower tab. Write the work by location, “drywall hung, operatories 1 to 4 and corridor”, not “drywall continued”.

Days with no work still need a report

The days with no work are the ones that get argued about. The ABA article says that when little or no work was performed on a day, including holidays and weekends, a contractor may record why and when work is expected to restart. American Bar Association

The federal specification goes further: all calendar days have to be accounted for over the life of the contract, with at least one report for every seven days of no work and one on the last day of a no-work period. WBDG

The template’s Calendar tab lists every day from the start of work to yesterday and marks any workday with no report as MISSING. Fill the gap while people still remember the day, and say why there was no work.

Weather days and delays: record them so you can prove them

On a federal fixed-price construction contract, unusually severe weather is one of the causes of delay that does not count against the contractor, but only if the contractor notifies the contracting officer in writing of the causes of the delay within 10 days from the beginning of the delay. On any other job, your contract’s own notice clause sets the deadline. Acquisition.gov

The daily report is where that clock starts. Write down what stopped the work, the cause, the hours lost, and the date the written notice went out. The template counts weather days lost against the allowance you put on Setup, adds up hours lost by cause, and flags any delay with no written notice once the notice period on Setup has passed.

For the weather itself, your own notes are the start, not the proof. NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information certifies weather records from its archive to meet the authentication requirements for records submitted as evidence in court. Certified copies cost from about $180, so order them for the days you are actually claiming. NOAA NCEI

Write down every instruction

The federal list includes instructions given or received. On any job, the instruction is the entry that pays for itself: who asked for what, when, and what you said back. If it changes the work, it is a change order, and the time to price it is before you build it. WBDG

The template’s Delays tab lists every instruction from the Daily Log and flags any marked as needing a change order that has no change order number yet. In the sample, the owner asks on site to move a door two feet; the report records it the same day, and the flag stays on until it is priced.

Safety incidents and the federal reporting deadlines

Record every first aid case and injury on the day, with what happened. Some have hard deadlines. OSHA requires an employer to report a work-related fatality within 8 hours, and an in-patient hospitalization, amputation or loss of an eye within 24 hours. OSHA

That reporting rule applies to every employer covered by the OSH Act, including the smallest: a company with 10 or fewer employees can be exempt from keeping OSHA injury and illness records, but not from reporting these incidents. OSHA

The template’s safety column takes None, First aid, Recordable or Reportable, flags any incident with no description, and reminds you of the OSHA deadlines on a reportable one.

Daily report checklist

These are the checks on the template’s Checklist tab.

1. Was it written the same day?

   What a good answer sounds like: Before the superintendent leaves site, by the person who was there. Not reconstructed on Friday.

2. Is there a report for every workday?

   What a good answer sounds like: Including days with no work, saying why and when work restarts.

3. Is the weather recorded morning and afternoon?

   What a good answer sounds like: Conditions, high and low, rain or snow, and whether it stopped work and for how long.

4. Does it say who was on site?

   What a good answer sounds like: Headcount by trade, your crew and every sub.

5. Is the work described by location?

   What a good answer sounds like: What was done, where and by whom. Not “framing continued”.

6. Are deliveries and equipment listed?

   What a good answer sounds like: What arrived, what was late, and the equipment on site, working or idle.

7. Are inspections and tests recorded with results?

   What a good answer sounds like: A failed inspection is a delay with a cause.

8. Is every instruction written down?

   What a good answer sounds like: Who said what, and when. If it changes the work, price it as a change order before you build it.

9. Does every delay have a cause, hours and a notice date?

   What a good answer sounds like: What happened, why, the hours lost, and when written notice went out.

10. Are safety incidents recorded?

    What a good answer sounds like: Every first aid case and injury, with what happened. Fatalities and serious injuries have federal reporting deadlines.

11. Are the photos filed by date?

    What a good answer sounds like: A photo reference on the report, with the photos stored by date so they match.

12. Is it signed and filed?

    What a good answer sounds like: Signed by whoever wrote it, reviewed by the project manager, and kept with the job file.

When a daily report spreadsheet stops being enough

The template works for one job with a superintendent who keeps it up. These are the signs it has been outgrown:

• Reports are written on a phone in a text thread and typed up later, if at all.
• The photos are on someone’s phone, not on the day they were taken.
• Nobody in the office reads the reports until there is a dispute.
• You run several jobs and cannot see which ones are missing reports this week.

At that point the daily report belongs on the job itself, where the superintendent writes it from site and the office sees it the same day.

Where WorkHoist helps

WorkHoist keeps one daily log per project per day, with weather morning and afternoon, high and low temperature, wind and precipitation, crew count, work performed, materials received, equipment on site, safety incidents, notes and photos. A delay can be flagged on the day, and the log list counts the flagged delays.

Field supervisors can write the log as well as the office. Each log goes from draft to submitted to approved, approving is for the project manager and up, and the approved log records who approved it and when; the author is always the signed-in user, so nobody can file a log as someone else. In settings you can rename, hide or require the log’s own fields and add fields of your own. WorkHoist does not fill in the weather for you, so note it morning and afternoon, and order certified records from NOAA for any day you claim.

Questions contractors ask

What is a construction daily report?

A construction daily report, or daily log, is the record of one day on a job: the weather, who was on site by trade, the work performed and where, deliveries, equipment, inspections, visitors, delays, instructions received and safety incidents. It is written by the superintendent or foreman the same day and is often relied on later in disputes over delays, weather days and changes.

What should a construction daily report include?

At least the date, weather morning and afternoon, headcount by trade, the work performed with its location and who did it, deliveries, equipment working or idle, inspections and tests with results, visitors, delays with their cause and hours lost, instructions given or received, safety incidents, photos, and the name and signature of whoever wrote it.

Who writes the construction daily report?

Usually the general contractor’s superintendent or foreman, and subcontractors often keep their own. On federal jobs that use the standard quality control specification, the project superintendent prepares and signs a daily production report and the quality control manager prepares and signs a daily quality control report.

Do you need a daily report on days with no work?

You should keep one. A report for a no-work day records why work stopped and when it is expected to restart, which is exactly what is argued about later. The federal quality control specification requires every calendar day to be accounted for, with at least one report for every seven days of no work and one on the last day of a no-work period.

How do daily reports help with weather delays?

They record what weather stopped the work, for how long, and when you gave notice. On federal fixed-price construction contracts, unusually severe weather can excuse a delay, but only if the contractor gives written notice within 10 days from the beginning of the delay. For proof of the weather itself, NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information certifies weather records for use as evidence in court.

Is a daily log the same as a daily report?

In practice, yes. Contractors use daily log, daily report, site diary and daily field report for the same record of one day on site. Some owners and federal contracts require their own form, so use the format in your contract when it sets one.

Is there a free construction daily report template?

Yes. WorkHoist’s construction daily report template is a free Excel file, with no sign-up or email, that also opens in Google Sheets. It keeps one row a day with weather, headcount by trade, work, deliveries, inspections, delays, instructions and safety, prints a one-page report for any day, counts weather days against your contract allowance, and flags any workday with no report.