BS 5975 and CDM 2015, UK wide
Temporary Works Coordination
Temporary works hold the permanent works up until the permanent works can hold themselves up. When they fail they fail suddenly, with people underneath or beside them. AL23 Safety provides temporary works coordination, design brief and design check management and site assurance for clients UK wide.
What is temporary works coordination?
One person with the register, the briefs and the authority to release the load
Temporary works coordination is the process set out in BS 5975, the code of practice for temporary works procedures and the permissible stress design of falsework. It puts a named individual in charge of identifying every item of temporary works on a project, making sure each one has a design brief, a design and an appropriate independent check and confirming in writing that it may be loaded and later dismantled.
The mechanism is deliberately simple. A designated individual within the organisation appoints a temporary works coordinator. The coordinator maintains the temporary works register, controls the flow of briefs and checks and issues the permit to load and the permit to dismantle. On larger or multi-area sites the coordinator is supported by temporary works supervisors who check on the ground that what was built matches what was designed.
The coordinator role is industry good practice rather than a statutory appointment. Nothing in law obliges you to appoint one by that title. The duties the role delivers are entirely statutory, which is the point worth understanding before you decide to run without it.
Who needs one
Anywhere a structure carries load before it is finished
- Principal contractors on projects involving excavations, falsework, formwork or propping.
- Developers and contractors carrying out facade retention on refurbishment and conversion schemes.
- Demolition contractors installing temporary support ahead of structural removal.
- Fit out and structural alteration contractors needling and propping to remove walls or beams.
- Clients running a programme of small works where nobody holds the register across projects.
- Anyone whose insurer, principal designer or framework client has asked who the temporary works coordinator is.
The regulations that apply
Your legal framework, in plain terms
The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 and the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 carry the legal duties. BS 5975 is a British Standard and carries none of its own, though it is the recognised means of discharging those duties and is written into most main contracts. The Work at Height Regulations 2005 and the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 apply to the equipment used to build and access temporary works. Part 4 of CDM 2015 sets general requirements for all construction sites, including duties on the stability of structures and on the support of excavations. Those are the provisions a temporary works failure is usually prosecuted under.
CDM 2015 regulation 4. Client duties
The client must make suitable arrangements for managing the project, which on a project with significant temporary works means satisfying itself that a coordination procedure exists.
CDM 2015 regulation 9. Designers
A designer must eliminate, reduce or control foreseeable risks arising from the design, including risks during construction. Buildability and the temporary condition sit squarely inside that duty.
CDM 2015 regulation 11. Principal designer
Plan, manage and monitor the pre-construction phase and coordinate design work, which includes making sure the temporary condition has been thought about before anyone is on site.
CDM 2015 regulation 13. Principal contractor
Plan, manage and monitor the construction phase. This is where the temporary works procedure lives in practice, referenced from the construction phase plan.
CDM 2015 Part 4. Stability of structures and excavations
Practicable steps must be taken to prevent danger from collapse, including support work. A structure must not be loaded in a way that makes it unsafe.
BS 5975
Sets the coordinator and supervisor roles, the register, the design brief, the design check categories and the permit to load and permit to dismantle sequence.
The honest bit about the coordinator role
No regulation names the temporary works coordinator. If a project goes wrong, the prosecution runs against the client, the principal contractor, the designer or the individual under section 7 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. The absence of a coordinator is not the offence. It is the reason the offence happened.
That distinction matters when you are being asked to appoint one on a small project. The right answer is not always a full time coordinator. It is always a named person, a register that lists every item and a rule that nothing gets loaded without a check. We will tell you which scale of arrangement your project actually needs.
What the service covers
From the register to the permit to dismantle
- Appointment support, including the designated individual role and a written temporary works procedure for your organisation.
- Acting as temporary works coordinator on a project or providing an independent audit of the coordinator you already have.
- Building and maintaining the temporary works register, item by item, with status and dates visible.
- Writing design briefs that state loads, ground conditions, tolerances, sequence and the constraints the designer must work within.
- Assigning the design check category to each item and recording the reasoning.
- Commissioning and managing temporary works design, including independent checks at the required level of separation.
- Excavation support, covering trench boxes, sheet piling, battering and the interaction with buried services and adjacent foundations.
- Falsework and formwork, including foundation and bearing checks, striking times and load transfer.
- Propping, needling and the load path from the propped element down to something that can carry it.
- Facade retention schemes, including wind loading, movement monitoring and the interface with the demolition sequence.
- Temporary edge protection, crane and piling rig platforms, hoardings and scaffold that falls outside standard configurations.
- Permits to load and permits to dismantle, with the site check that precedes each one.
Our process
Procedure, register, design, site check, then dismantle
- 01
Procedure and appointments
We review or write your temporary works procedure, confirm who the designated individual is and set out how the coordinator and supervisors are appointed in writing.
- 02
Register build
We walk the drawings and the programme with your team and list every item of temporary works, including the ones nobody thinks of as temporary works such as trench support and plant platforms.
- 03
Brief and design
Each item gets a design brief. We assign a check category, commission the design where you do not hold it in-house and manage the independent check to the level that category requires.
- 04
Site assurance
Before loading, we check that what has been built matches the design and the drawing revision on site, then issue the permit to load.
- 05
Dismantling and close-out
We confirm the permanent works can carry the load, issue the permit to dismantle and close the register item with the records attached.
What you get
A live register and a signed permit trail
- A written temporary works procedure aligned to BS 5975 and referenced from your construction phase plan.
- A live temporary works register showing every item, its check category, its status and who owns it.
- Design briefs that a designer can actually price and work to.
- Design check records at the correct level of independence, held with the design they relate to.
- Signed permits to load and permits to dismantle for each item.
- A close-out pack for the health and safety file, showing what was installed, what was checked and when it was removed.
What we need from you
The programme, the drawings and the ground data
- The programme, the structural drawings and the demolition or alteration sequence.
- Ground investigation reports, existing structure surveys and any load test data you hold.
- Details of the plant coming to site, including crane and piling rig outrigger loads.
- Your current temporary works procedure and register, even where it is incomplete.
- The name of the person in your organisation who can appoint and back a coordinator.
Why AL23 Safety
No check at the right category, no permit
Accountable
If an item has not been checked at the right category, it does not get a permit to load. We would rather have the difficult conversation before the pour than after it.
Expert and chartered
Chartered Building Engineer and Health and Safety Professional input so the structural question and the safety question are answered by the same team.
Practical, not just compliant
We scope the work, appoint the right specialist, interpret the results and turn them into an action plan you can actually deliver. A register that lives on the wall beats a procedure that lives in a folder.
UK wide
We support temporary works on projects across the UK, from single storey needling to full facade retention and we integrate it with CDM consultant services and working at height safety rather than running it separately.
Not sure whether your project needs a coordinator
Send us the programme and we will tell you straight
A short call and a look at the sequence is usually enough for us to say whether you need a full time coordinator, a part time one or a procedure and an audit. We will say if the answer is the cheapest of the three.
Common questions
Answers, up front
Cannot see your question? Get in touch and we will answer it directly.
Contact usNo. The role comes from BS 5975, which is a British Standard and not legislation. The duties it delivers are statutory, arising from CDM 2015 and the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. Most main contracts and most principal contractors require the appointment so it is contractually compulsory far more often than it is legally so.
The coordinator holds the register, controls the design brief and check process and issues the permits. The supervisor works to the coordinator on a defined area or item and checks on site that the installation matches the design. On a small project one person may do both. On a large or multi-area site, splitting them is what keeps the coordinator from becoming a bottleneck.
BS 5975 grades the independence of the check by the complexity and consequence of the item, running from standard solutions at the lowest category up to complex or innovative designs at the highest. The higher the category, the further the checker must sit from the original designer, ending with a check by a separate organisation. The category is agreed at design brief stage rather than argued about after the design arrives.
Yes. Scaffold is temporary works, though standard configurations within the scope of published technical guidance are managed through compliance sheets rather than bespoke design. Anything outside that scope needs a design and a check like any other item and the inspection duties under regulation 12 of the Work at Height Regulations 2005 apply throughout. Our scaffold inspections service covers that side.
Scaled down, yes. A single needled opening still involves a load path, a prop that has to be adequate and a sequence that has to be right. The register might be one page and the check might be a category the designer can self-certify. What does not scale down is the rule that nothing gets loaded until someone competent has confirmed the design and the installation match.
Cost depends on whether we act as coordinator or audit yours, the number and complexity of items, the length of the programme and whether design and independent checking are included. A procedure plus a monthly audit on a straightforward project is a modest commitment. A facade retention scheme with continuous coordination is not. Send the programme and the sequence and we will price it properly.
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