Most contractors have allocation sheets. Far fewer have good ones. And the gap between "we do them" and "we do them properly" is where hundreds of thousands of pounds disappear on every major project. This page explains what a daily allocation sheet actually is, why it exists, how it connects to your commercial management under NEC4, and what goes wrong when it's done badly. If you're looking for a ready-to-use template, head to our allocation sheet template page.
What Is a Daily Allocation Sheet?
A daily allocation sheet records the deployment of resources against activities for a single day. Think of it as the financial X-ray of your site operations. While a site diary tells you what happened, an allocation sheet tells you what it cost.
The typical allocation sheet captures five categories of information:
- Labour: Names or trade categories, hours worked, and the activity each person was allocated to
- Plant and equipment: What machinery was on site, whether it was working or standing, and which activity it supported
- Materials: What was delivered, what was used, and against which activity reference
- Activity references: Each resource entry ties back to a specific activity in the programme or bill of quantities
- Subcontractor resources: The same breakdown for any subcontracted labour or plant
That last point is the one people miss. Your subcontractors' allocation records matter just as much as your own, because under NEC4 Option C contracts, their costs feed directly into your Defined Cost.
For a deeper look at the differences, see our comparison of site diaries versus allocation sheets.
Why Daily Allocation Sheets Matter Commercially
I'll be blunt. Allocation sheets aren't exciting. Nobody wakes up excited to fill one in. But they're the single most important document for protecting your commercial position on any NEC4 contract, and here's why.
Labour and Plant Are Your Biggest Cost Exposure
On a typical infrastructure project, labour and plant account for 40% to 55% of total project costs. On a £50M highways scheme, that's £20M to £27.5M spent over the project lifecycle, often with no granular record of where it went. Are your allocation sheets capturing it? Because if they're not, you're flying blind on your biggest cost line.
Without daily allocation records, your cost reporting relies on payroll data (which tells you who got paid, not what they did) and plant hire invoices (which tell you what was on site, not whether it was productive). Try building a disruption claim on that. You can't.
Defined Cost Under NEC4 Demands Granular Records
Under NEC4 Option C and Option E contracts, the Contractor is paid Defined Cost plus Fee. Defined Cost is defined in the Schedule of Cost Components, and it requires you to demonstrate that costs were actually and reasonably incurred. The Project Manager can disallow any cost that isn't supported by proper records.
Here's where it gets painful. Clause 52.2 requires the Contractor to keep records that the Project Manager can inspect. If you can't link a cost back to a specific activity on a specific day, the Project Manager has grounds to treat it as disallowed cost. I've seen this happen on a £35M rail package where the Contractor lost £420,000 in otherwise legitimate costs because the allocation sheets were inconsistent. The costs were real. The records didn't prove it.
Compensation Event Assessment Depends on Resource Records
When a compensation event occurs under NEC4, the assessment under clause 63 is based on the effect on Defined Cost. That means you need to show what resources were planned for the activity, what resources were actually used following the compensation event, and the difference between the two.
Without allocation sheets, you can't do this. You can write a compelling narrative about why the CE caused disruption, but you can't put a number on it. And in adjudication, numbers win. Narratives don't.
Proving Disruption Requires a Baseline
Disruption claims require you to demonstrate the difference between planned productivity and actual productivity. Your planned productivity comes from the Accepted Programme and your tender build-up. Your actual productivity comes from your allocation sheets.
On a £40M Network Rail electrification package in the West Midlands, the commercial team needed to demonstrate that a series of late design changes had caused a 35% drop in productivity for overhead line equipment installation. They could only prove it because they had 14 months of daily allocation sheets showing labour hours per unit of OLE installed. Without those sheets, the disruption claim, worth £1.8M, would have been guesswork.
Who Fills In a Daily Allocation Sheet?
This varies by contractor, and the variation is part of the problem.
On well-run projects, the allocation sheet is completed by the site foreman or section engineer at the end of each shift. They're closest to the work. They know which operatives were on which activity, whether the 360 excavator was productive or standing idle waiting for a permit, and how many m³ of Type 1 were laid.
On less well-run projects? It's done retrospectively by a QS or administrator using payroll records and best guesses. Sometimes days later. Sometimes weeks later. At that point, you don't have an allocation sheet. You have historical fiction.
The golden rule: the person who saw the work should record the work. If the foreman was standing at the muck-away point watching six wagons queue for two hours because the haul road was blocked by a utility diversion, that needs recording at the time. Not reconstructed from memory the following Tuesday.
For practical tips on how to capture this information effectively, see our guide on how to write a site diary.
How Allocation Sheets Fit Into the Wider Records Ecosystem
An allocation sheet doesn't exist in isolation. It's one piece of a records architecture that, when it works properly, gives you an airtight commercial position. When one piece is missing, the whole thing weakens.
| Record Type | What It Captures | How It Links to the Allocation Sheet |
|---|---|---|
| Site diary | Narrative of daily events, weather, visitors, instructions | Allocation sheet provides the numbers behind the diary narrative |
| Accepted Programme | Planned activities, durations, resources | Allocation sheet shows actual vs planned resource deployment |
| Daywork sheets | Agreed additional work outside the contract scope | Allocation sheet provides the contemporaneous evidence for daywork claims |
| Cost reports | Monthly cost vs budget by activity | Allocation sheets feed the actual cost data into cost reports |
| Timesheets / payroll | Who was paid for what hours | Allocation sheet adds the dimension of what they were doing |
| Progress records | Percentage complete by activity | Allocation sheets link resource input to measured output |
The most common failure I see? Contractors who keep site diaries and timesheets but don't connect them through an allocation sheet. The diary says "8 operatives on drainage." Payroll confirms 8 people were on site. But nobody recorded which drainage activity each operative worked on, what plant they used, or how much pipe was installed. When you need to evidence a disruption claim nine months later, you've got two documents that confirm the same vague fact and nothing that proves the detail.
Worked Example: How a Complete Allocation Sheet Protects Your Position
Scenario: On a £28M NEC4 Option C highway improvement scheme in South Yorkshire, the Client issues a revised traffic management drawing on 12 June 2025 that requires the Contractor to work from one lane instead of two for a 300m section. The Contractor notifies a compensation event under clause 61.3 on 14 June 2025.
Without allocation sheets: The Contractor knows the change slowed them down. The foreman mentions it took "about twice as long" to complete the surfacing. The QS estimates an additional cost of £85,000 based on gut feel and a rough calculation. The Project Manager assesses the CE at £40,000 because there's no evidence to support the higher figure. The Contractor accepts the assessment because they can't prove otherwise.
With allocation sheets: The allocation sheets show that for the 10 working days before the change (28 May to 11 June 2025), the surfacing gang of 12 operatives and 3 plant items completed an average of 45m of surfacing per day. For the 15 working days after the change (12 June to 2 July 2025), the same gang with the same plant completed an average of 22m per day. Material deliveries were delayed by an average of 40 minutes per load due to the restricted access.
The QS builds a Defined Cost assessment:
- Additional labour: 12 operatives x 5 extra days x £380/day = £22,800
- Additional plant: 3 items x 5 extra days x £1,200/day = £18,000
- Standing time (material delivery delays): 15 days x 40 mins x £95/hr = £9,500
- Preliminaries extension: 5 days x £4,800/day = £24,000
- Subcontractor traffic management: 5 extra days x £3,400/day = £17,000
- Total Defined Cost impact: £91,300 (plus Fee)
The Project Manager's assessment comes back at £86,500. Close to the Contractor's figure, because both parties are working from the same factual base. No adjudication needed.
That's the difference. Not theory. Real money, recoverable because someone filled in an allocation sheet properly every day for six weeks.
What to Include in a Daily Allocation Sheet
Your allocation sheet needs to capture enough detail that someone who wasn't on site could reconstruct what happened, what it cost, and why. Here's what good looks like.
Essential Fields
| Field | What to Record | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Date and shift | Day, date, shift start and end | Monday 12 June 2025, 07:00-17:30 |
| Weather | Conditions that affected work | Heavy rain 07:00-09:30, dry thereafter |
| Labour by activity | Trade, number, hours, activity ref | 4 x Steel fixers, 8 hrs, Act 4.3.2 (pile caps) |
| Plant by activity | Item, hours, working/standing, activity ref | CAT 320 excavator, 10 hrs (8 working, 2 standing - no permit), Act 2.1.1 |
| Materials by activity | Type, quantity, activity ref | Ready-mix concrete C40, 24 m³, Act 4.3.2 |
| Subcontractors | Company, trade, number, hours, activity ref | ABC Piling Ltd, 6 operatives + CFA rig, 10 hrs, Act 3.1.1 |
| Standing time | Resource, duration, reason | 360 excavator stood 2 hrs awaiting statutory utility location |
| Instructions received | Who gave it, what it was, time | PM's delegate verbal instruction at 11:15 to relocate stockpile |
| Signatures | Completed by, verified by | Completed: J. Thompson (Foreman). Verified: S. Patel (Section Eng.) |
For a comprehensive checklist of what to include in a site diary, see our field-by-field reference guide.
The Activity Reference Is Non-Negotiable
Every resource entry must tie to an activity reference from the programme or bill of quantities. "4 labourers on general duties" is useless for cost allocation. "4 labourers, 8 hours each, Activity 5.2.1 (concrete blinding to foundations)" tells you exactly where the cost sits.
Without activity references, your allocation sheet is just an expensive attendance register.
Common Mistakes with Daily Allocation Sheets
1. Retrospective Completion
The most damaging mistake. When allocation sheets are filled in days or weeks after the event, accuracy plummets. I've reviewed projects where the same allocation sheet was clearly copied from the previous day with minor tweaks. Under cross-examination in adjudication, this destroys credibility.
Fill them in at the end of each shift. Not the next morning. Not Friday afternoon for the whole week.
2. Missing Activity References
Recording that 8 operatives worked 10 hours is meaningless without knowing which activity consumed those hours. You might as well not bother. It's like recording that you spent money without noting what you bought.
3. Not Recording Standing Time
Standing time is cost without output. If your 360 excavator stood idle for 3 hours because the utility company didn't show up for a cable location, that's a potential compensation event. But only if you recorded it, when it happened, and why.
The natural instinct is to record productive work. You need to fight that instinct and record the gaps with equal discipline.
4. Ignoring Subcontractor Resources
Your subcontractor's allocation records are your responsibility under NEC4 Option C. Their Defined Cost feeds into your Defined Cost. If their records are poor, your commercial position is weakened even though you didn't do anything wrong.
Require your subcontractors to submit daily allocation sheets in the same format as your own. Review them weekly. Push back on vague entries immediately, not three months later during an interim application.
5. No Connection to the Programme
An allocation sheet that doesn't reference the programme is a standalone document. It tells you what resources were deployed, but not whether that deployment was efficient, on track, or disrupted. The programme is the baseline. Without it, you're recording facts in a vacuum.
6. Paper-Based Systems with No Backup
Duplicate pads in the foreman's van. Filed in a box in the site office. Then the site office gets broken into, or the van gets stolen, or someone accidentally throws the box away during a site clearance. I've seen all three.
Digital systems don't solve the discipline problem, but they do solve the storage and retrieval problem. Gather automates the connection between site diary entries and allocation data, so the commercial team can pull resource records by activity, by date range, or by cost centre without rummaging through filing cabinets.
Daily Allocation Sheet vs Site Diary: Understanding the Difference
People conflate these two documents constantly. They're related but different.
| Aspect | Site Diary | Daily Allocation Sheet |
|---|---|---|
| Purpose | Narrative record of daily events | Quantitative record of resource deployment |
| Who writes it | Site manager or engineer | Foreman or section engineer |
| Content focus | What happened and why | Who/what was deployed where and for how long |
| Format | Prose with structured fields | Tabular, activity-referenced |
| Commercial use | Evidence for events, instructions, conditions | Evidence for cost, productivity, disruption |
| NEC4 relevance | Supports notification of compensation events | Supports Defined Cost assessment |
Think of it this way: the site diary is the witness statement, and the allocation sheet is the financial evidence. You need both. For a deeper comparison, see our dedicated page on site diary vs allocation sheet.
NEC4 Context: Why the Contract Demands These Records
NEC4 doesn't use the phrase "allocation sheet" anywhere in the contract. But the contract mechanisms assume you have this level of record. Here's how.
Schedule of Cost Components
Under NEC4 Options C, D, and E, the Contractor is paid Defined Cost. The Schedule of Cost Components breaks Defined Cost into people, equipment, plant and materials, charges, and manufacture and fabrication. To claim any of these, you need to demonstrate that the cost was incurred on the project, for the project, and can be allocated to a specific activity.
That's an allocation sheet. The contract just doesn't call it one.
Clause 52: Records and Auditing
Clause 52.2 requires the Contractor to keep the records the contract requires and allow the Project Manager to inspect them. On target cost contracts, the Project Manager routinely requests to see daily resource records as part of cost audits. If you can't produce them, you're inviting the Project Manager to assess your Defined Cost at a lower figure.
Compensation Event Assessment (Clause 63)
When assessing a compensation event, clause 63.1 requires the assessment to be based on the effect on Defined Cost plus the resulting Fee. To calculate the effect on Defined Cost, you need to compare the resources that would have been needed without the compensation event against the resources actually used. Your allocation sheets provide the "actually used" side of that equation.
Disallowed Cost (Clause 11.2(26))
Defined Cost that the Project Manager decides is not justified by the Contractor's records can be classified as disallowed cost. This is the nuclear option, and it happens more often than contractors like to admit. Strong allocation records are your shield.
For more on this risk, see our guide on NEC4 disallowed cost and the bridge page on site diary compensation events.
How Gather Automates Allocation Tracking
The discipline of filling in allocation sheets will never go away. Someone on site needs to record what happened. But the downstream processes? Linking allocation data to activities. Feeding it into cost reports. Retrieving records for CE assessments. None of that needs to be manual.
Gather's QS AI Agent connects daily site records directly to your programme activities and contract mechanisms. When your foreman records labour and plant deployment through Gather's site diary, the system automatically:
- Tags resources against programme activities
- Flags standing time and potential compensation events
- Links resource data to Defined Cost categories
- Makes allocation records searchable by date, activity, cost centre, or resource type
- Alerts the commercial team when recorded deployment differs significantly from planned deployment
The result? Your commercial team spends time on commercial management, not on chasing foremen for missing allocation sheets or reconciling paper records against payroll.
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