A daily log your crew can finish before leaving site
Five sections, each short enough that a site lead will actually fill it: who was on site and for how long, what got built and where, what arrived, what went wrong, and who visited. Hours total themselves from start and finish times.
Excel / Google Sheets compatible · no sign-up required
Three steps to a working document
Fill it on site, not from memory
A log written a week later from a few photographs is a document nobody can rely on, and it is worth nothing in the argument it was supposed to settle. The sheet is short so that finishing it before you leave is realistic.
Be specific about what was built
"Framing" is not a log entry. "Framed second-floor partitions, north side" is. The test is whether someone reading it in two years knows what was done and where.
Record delays the day they happen
The delay section is the one that pays for the whole exercise: what happened, what caused it, hours lost, and who was told. That last column is what turns a complaint into a claim.
A daily log is a business record, not a legal instrument. What it is worth in a dispute depends on it being contemporaneous, consistent and specific — a log filled in properly for three weeks and abandoned is weaker than no log at all, because the gap becomes the story. Check whether your contract sets its own requirements for site records and notice periods.
When the spreadsheet stops scaling
In BuildersBridge the daily log lives against the job with the photos attached to the day, so the record is built as the work happens rather than reconstructed at handover.
See how it works in BuildersBridgeCommon questions
What should a construction daily log include?
Date, project, weather and conditions; the crew on site with hours; work completed by area; deliveries received; delays with cause, hours lost and who was notified; visitors and inspections; and a reference to the photos taken. Those seven cover almost every question a log is later asked to answer.
Who should fill in the daily log?
Whoever was on site and knows what happened — usually the site lead or foreman. A log filled in by the office from a phone call is a summary of a summary.
Why does the log matter for delay claims?
Because a delay claim rests on showing what happened, when, why, and that the other party was told. A contemporaneous record does that; a reconstruction argued months later does not carry the same weight.
Does it work in Google Sheets?
Yes. Upload the .xlsx to Google Drive and open with Sheets. The hours calculation from start and finish times carries over.