These two documents are confused constantly, and the confusion is expensive: a subcontractor asked for a construction phase plan sends a RAMS, a small contractor on a single-contractor project produces twelve RAMS and no plan, and in both cases the work does not start.
The distinction is one of altitude. The construction phase plan governs the site. The RAMS governs a task.
The construction phase plan
Required by CDM 2015 regulation 12. On projects with more than one contractor the principal contractor draws it up before the construction phase begins; where there is only one contractor, that contractor does. It must set out the health and safety arrangements for the construction phase, the site rules, and — where relevant — specific measures for work involving the particular risks listed in Schedule 3, such as work that puts workers at risk of burial in an excavation, drowning, falls from height, work with chemical or biological substances, work near high-voltage power lines, and work involving assembly or dismantling of heavy prefabricated components.
In practice a plan covers the project description and programme, the management team and their responsibilities, the arrangements for communication and coordination between contractors, site induction and training arrangements, welfare provision, emergency and fire arrangements, first aid, site security and access control, traffic and pedestrian management, permit regimes, the site rules, and how contractors' own documents will be reviewed and monitored.
Its reader is everybody on the project. Its author owns the site, not the task.
The RAMS
Not named in CDM 2015 at all. It is how a contractor evidences the risk assessment required by regulation 3 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 and the planning required by CDM 2015 regulation 15, for one package of work.
A RAMS covers a defined scope, the hazards that scope creates, the controls, the residual risk, the sequence of work, the people and their competence, the plant, the materials, the PPE, and the emergency arrangements as they apply to that task. Its reader is the gang doing the work and the reviewer approving it. The fifteen sections every RAMS should contain sets out the full structure.
Side by side
- Legal basis: CPP is named in CDM 2015 regulation 12; RAMS is the practical output of MHSWR regulation 3 and CDM regulation 15.
- Author: CPP by the principal contractor, or the sole contractor; RAMS by each contractor for its own work.
- Scope: CPP covers the whole site for the whole construction phase; RAMS covers one activity or package.
- Reader: CPP is read by everyone managing the project; RAMS is read by the people doing the task.
- Lifespan: CPP is live for the project and revised as it changes; a RAMS is revised whenever its own scope, method or conditions change.
- Detail: CPP states arrangements and rules; RAMS states hazards, scores, controls and a step-by-step method.
How they fit together
The construction phase plan sets the rules; the RAMS must comply with them. If the plan mandates a permit for hot works, your RAMS names the permit and who obtains it. If the plan sets a site-wide exclusion regime around plant, your RAMS works within it rather than inventing its own. If the plan sets delivery windows, your method statement respects them.
Information flows both ways. The plan is informed by the pre-construction information at the start, and revised as contractors' RAMS reveal interfaces the principal contractor has to coordinate — two trades needing the same scaffold, a lift that closes a route another gang depends on. That coordination is the whole point of the principal contractor role, and it is why they read your document the way described in what a principal contractor looks for.
If there is only one contractor
You still need a construction phase plan. This is the most commonly missed requirement on small projects: a sole contractor doing a domestic extension must draw up a plan before the construction phase begins. It can be short — for a small, low-risk job, a few pages covering the arrangements, the site rules and the significant risks is proportionate — but a plan there must be. HSE's guidance is clear that proportionality applies to the length, not to the existence.
Proportion, both ways
A twelve-page construction phase plan for a bathroom refit is padding. So is a two-page plan for a school extension with eight subcontractors. The test in both directions is whether the plan actually describes how this project's significant risks will be managed. A plan that could be for any project has failed the test regardless of length.
The same holds for RAMS. Both documents get reviewed against reality, and a document that fails the site-specific test does so for the same reasons described in generic versus site-specific RAMS. If you are unsure which document you have been asked for, ask — the answer takes a minute and a wrong submission costs a week. Which document types can be reviewed covers what Valify reads on each plan, and why a plan is not one of the things a RAMS review can usefully be pointed at.
This article is general guidance on UK construction documentation practice. It is not legal advice, a compliance certification or a substitute for review by your own qualified health and safety personnel, who remain responsible for deciding whether any particular document is adequate. See our disclaimer.