Documenting Site Damage During a Construction Project

I am usually the last trade in the building. By the time I show up with grinders and a vacuum, twenty people have spent six months walking on the slab I am about to make permanent. Whatever they dropped, dragged or spilled becomes my problem the day the floor gets a finish.

A Broadmoor new build taught me the habit. I walked in to coat a three-car garage and found a 30 inch spall at the door edge and a six-foot stain where something hydraulic had soaked in. The superintendent said, in good faith, that it was there when he got there. Two subs said the same. Nobody had a photograph of that slab between the day it was poured and the day I opened the door, so the argument was unwinnable and I ate a grind-and-patch nobody had budgeted, about $1,300 on a job I had priced at $4,100.

Now I shoot the floor before I unload a machine. Fifteen minutes, and it has saved me more than any tool I own.

Photograph the surface the day you take it over

The point is not artistic. A dated image of an undamaged surface is the only thing that makes later damage provable. Work a grid, so you show coverage rather than cherry-picking:

Wide shots down each wall with 30 percent overlap, so they stitch into a record with no gaps.
Every crack with a tape measure open across it, and a second shot with a coin for scale.
Spalls, popouts and chipped joint edges, close and wide, so the location is obvious later.
Stains, noting whether they sit on top or soaked in.
Control and construction joints, including any already filled or spalling.
The apron, threshold and first ten feet outside the door, where delivery damage lands.
Moisture test locations, instruments in place, and the readings, dated.

Leave location data and timestamps on; a phone carries both automatically. Then do the step nobody does: write a one-page condition report, attach the photos, and email it to the owner and the general contractor the same day. Email puts a timestamp and a third party in the middle. A desktop folder does not.

Photograph the things nobody photographs

The arguments I see are never about the obvious 30 inch spall. They are about small things that only matter once a floor is finished:

Curing compound or sealer applied without telling anyone. It changes the prep scope entirely and stays invisible until water beads on it.
Drywall mud, thinset and paint overspray ground in.
Forklift tire marks, and the ruts a loaded dumpster leaves on a green slab.
Joints cut late — you can see the raveling — or cut too shallow, which is why cracking shows up beside them.

Add a running log: date, who was on site, what got delivered, what the weather did. Thirty seconds a day. Eight months later it turns a memory into a record.

Damage or tolerance — know which you are looking at

This is where these conversations go sideways. Not everything ugly is damage. Slabs on grade develop drying shrinkage cracks — that is what control joints are for — and hairline cracking under 1/16 inch is normal, not defective. Flatness and levelness have published tolerances, so a floor can look wavy and still sit inside the spec the owner signed. ACI 117 is the tolerance document the industry works to, and ACI is where you find it.

Knowing that line matters both ways: it stops you flagging something that was always within spec, and accepting something that never was. I look hardest for faulting over about 1/8 inch, which means something under the slab moved, and for cracks crossing a control joint, which means the jointing did not do its job.

Keep the record, and keep it boring

One dated folder per project: photos, condition report, delivery tickets, moisture results, daily notes, email chain. Keep it at least as long as the workmanship warranty, commonly one to two years, and longer on a big project. Time limits for raising construction issues vary by state, so keep it longer than feels necessary.

When damage does turn up, the pattern is consistent: it is raised in writing while the responsible crew is still on site, the scope narrows with two independent estimates — spall repair usually prices at $300 to $900, coating rework at $6 to $12 per square foot — and it settles between the owner, the contractor who scheduled the work, and whichever policy covers it. Access terms are often printed on the ticket or written into the contract, so how it lands depends on that language and your state. Preventing damage is cheaper — our notes on protecting a driveway during a roof or concrete delivery cover the plywood-and-planning side.

Frequently asked questions

What photos matter most if I only take a few? Wide shots of the whole surface with something identifiable in frame, plus close shots of every crack with a tape measure in them. Wide establishes what the area looked like on a date; close establishes size.

How long should site documentation be kept? Through the workmanship warranty at minimum, commonly one to two years, and preferably several years past that. Storage is nearly free, and the questions that come back late are the ones nobody has notes on.

Is a pre-existing crack the owner’s problem or the contractor’s? That depends on the contract and on what was documented before work started, which is why a dated pre-condition record is worth the fifteen minutes. Without one, an old crack and a new one look identical afterward, and the discussion becomes two opinions. Masonry work generates the same argument about pre-existing cracks, and an Atlanta masonry contractor will usually photograph an elevation before setting up staging.

Trade body: American Society of Concrete Contractors.