Quick answer
A RAMS document is a combined Risk Assessment and Method Statement that explains, in plain language, the hazards on a specific job and the safe step-by-step method your team will follow. Under CDM 2015 there is no fixed template, but principal contractors expect a site-specific document covering scope, hazards, controls, sequence, plant, roles, PPE, emergency procedures, and a briefing record. Most trades businesses can produce a usable RAMS in 30 to 60 minutes using a structured template; AI tools can shorten that to under 15 minutes, provided a competent person reviews every output before it goes on site.
Table of contents
- What a RAMS document actually is
- Why principal contractors insist on it
- What every RAMS must contain
- Step-by-step: writing your first RAMS
- The TrainAR RAMS template structure
- Using AI to draft RAMS in minutes
- Briefing the team and signing off on site
- Common mistakes that get RAMS rejected
- Recommended videos
- What tradespeople are saying
- Frequently asked questions
- My verdict
What a RAMS document actually is
RAMS is short for Risk Assessment and Method Statement. They are two separate legal documents bolted together because, on most UK construction jobs, principal contractors want them in one bundle and want them before the job starts.
The Risk Assessment side identifies the hazards on the job, who could be harmed, how serious that harm could be, and what controls reduce the risk to an acceptable level. The Method Statement side describes how the work will be done in a safe sequence: arrival, isolation, the actual steps of the task, clean-down, sign-off.
The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require risk assessments. The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 (CDM 2015) add the duty for principal contractors to plan, manage and monitor the construction phase, which is why method statements have become standard for any job above a domestic call-out.
There is no fixed RAMS format in law. What there is, in practice, is a format that principal contractors accept and one that they reject. This guide gives you the version that gets accepted.
Why principal contractors insist on it
If you walk on to a site and your RAMS is wrong, the cost is not a fine. The cost is being turned away from the gate. That is the bit that catches subcontractors out.
A principal contractor uses your RAMS to confirm three things before they let you start: you understand the specific hazards on their site, you have the kit and competence to control them, and your team will be briefed before they pick up a tool. A document that ticks generic boxes without mentioning their site, their interfaces with other trades, or their access route, fails on all three.
The job of the document is to prove a safe system of work exists. The job of the briefing is to make sure the team follows it. The two are equally important. A RAMS that lives in an email and never reaches the engineer on the van is, in practice, no RAMS at all.
What every RAMS must contain
Every RAMS that gets approved on a UK site covers the same ground. The order varies slightly between organisations, but the content does not. Here is what to include, why each section matters, and the level of detail that gets a tick rather than a query.
Cover page and version control
Company name, registered office, document title, project name, project address, document reference number, revision number and date, author, reviewer, approver. The version block matters more than most trades realise. If your team is briefed against Rev 2 and Rev 3 has been issued, you have a problem.
Scope of work
One paragraph that describes exactly what work this RAMS covers. Include what is in scope and what is explicitly out of scope. Generic phrases like "electrical works" are not enough. "Replacement of three single-phase consumer units in occupied flats 12, 14 and 16, including final circuit testing and certification" is enough.
Site information and access
Site address, working hours, welfare arrangements, parking, access routes, lift availability, restrictions imposed by the principal contractor. This is where most generic templates fall down. Site-specific information cannot be copied from the last job.
Hazard identification and risk assessment
List every significant hazard, who is at risk, the existing control measures, the residual risk rating, and any additional controls. Use a simple 5x5 likelihood and severity matrix. Anything above a medium residual risk needs additional controls or a different method.
Method statement (the safe sequence)
Step by step, in plain language, how the work will be done. Number the steps. Include isolation, testing for dead, work, re-energise, hand-back. Reference the hazards each step controls. Do not write it like a textbook. Write it like a briefing.
Plant, tools and equipment
List the kit needed, including any LOLER-inspected equipment, calibration dates for test instruments, and PPE for each task. If a step requires a specific tool or torque value, name it.
Roles and responsibilities
Who is the supervisor, who issues permits, who carries out the work, who checks it. Names of the competent persons on site for each task and the certifications they hold (NICEIC, Gas Safe, IPAF, PASMA, asbestos awareness, first aid).
Emergency procedures
What happens if there is an injury, a fire, a release. Nearest A&E, site first aider, location of fire points and assembly points. If you work on occupied premises, how the occupants are protected.
Briefing record and sign-off
A table for every operative to sign confirming they understand the RAMS, the hazards and the controls. No briefing, no work. This is the single most common gap.
Step-by-step: writing your first RAMS
Step 1. Define the scope in one paragraph
Write what you are doing, where, when, and how many operatives. Be specific. If you cannot describe the job in one paragraph, you do not understand it well enough to write a method.
Step 2. Walk the site, or at minimum video-call it
A RAMS written from a desk without seeing the site is the most common reason for rejection. If a physical visit is not possible, ask the principal contractor for current site photos, a CAD layout, and the current construction phase plan.
Step 3. List every hazard and rate it before controls
Use a 5x5 matrix. Likelihood 1 to 5, severity 1 to 5, multiply for the raw risk score. Write controls. Re-rate. The residual risk after controls is what gets reviewed.
Step 4. Write the method as a sequence
Numbered steps in chronological order. Each step in two or three sentences. Reference the relevant control measures from your risk assessment. Include hold points where a check or sign-off must happen before progressing.
Step 5. List plant, PPE, and test equipment
Include calibration dates, LOLER expiry dates, BS 7671 test instrument certificates. If you need it, list it.
Step 6. Name the responsible people
Supervisor, site contact, first aider, fire warden if required. Names not job titles where possible. The principal contractor wants to know who to talk to.
Step 7. Add emergency procedures specific to the site
Postcode-level emergency contacts. Nearest A&E with a major emergency department. Site assembly point. If your team has not worked at this site before, walk them to the assembly point on day one.
Step 8. Get it reviewed and signed off
A competent person who did not draft the RAMS should review it. This is not optional. If you are a sole trader, find someone in your network who will swap reviews with you.
Step 9. Brief the team and record the briefing
Every operative signs to confirm they understand the document. The briefing record is part of the RAMS, not separate from it. If a principal contractor asks to see the briefing record, you produce it on the spot.
The TrainAR RAMS template structure
A good template gives you the headings and the prompts. It does not give you the content. A template that auto-generates content without asking site-specific questions is the reason generic RAMS exist, and the reason they get rejected.
The structure we recommend has fourteen sections in this order: cover and version, scope, site information, applicable legislation and standards, hazard identification, risk assessment table, method sequence, plant and equipment, PPE, roles and competencies, emergency procedures, environmental considerations, briefing and sign-off, and a revision history at the back.
Fourteen sections sounds like a lot. For a one-day domestic install it sits at five or six pages. For a multi-day commercial job it might run to fifteen. The point is not page count. The point is that every section has been considered. A blank section header that says "Not applicable, single dwelling, no asbestos register required" is a better document than the same header silently omitted.
For trades who want to skip the formatting work, the same structure is built into our internal building control notification templates and the BSI standards documentation that we ship to TrainAR members. The same headings, the same version control, the same briefing record. Once you have one template that works, every job uses the same skeleton.
Using AI to draft RAMS in minutes
ChatGPT
Claude
CopilotA general-purpose AI like ChatGPT, Claude, or Microsoft Copilot can cut your RAMS drafting time from three hours to under thirty minutes. Used badly, it produces a believable document that is wrong for the job and fails on review. Used well, it produces a solid first draft that a competent person finalises.
The trick is what you put into the prompt. The more site-specific information you give the AI, the more useful the output. The less you give it, the more it invents generic controls that do not match your job.
A working prompt template
The hazards you flag in the prompt matter more than the trade or the scope. AI is reasonable at populating generic hazards for a known trade. It is poor at inventing hazards specific to a site it has never seen. If you tell it the boiler is in a domestic loft with a single-skin ladder access, it will write the working-at-height controls. If you do not tell it, it will assume ground-floor work.
The non-negotiable human step
The risk with AI-generated RAMS is the believable-but-wrong document. It reads fluently. It uses the right language. It cites legislation. And it has missed the one hazard that matters on this job because you forgot to mention it in the prompt. A five-minute human review by someone who knows the site catches that.
The Health and Safety Executive has not banned AI-generated RAMS, and there is no current case law against them. What there is, in practice, is a growing expectation from principal contractors that the named author of the document can defend every line of it under questioning. That standard applies whether you typed every word or used AI to draft the structure.
For more on where AI sits in a wider trades business, see our guide on asbestos surveys before renovation, which covers similar AI-assisted documentation workflows for pre-start surveys.
Briefing the team and signing off on site
A RAMS is approved when the principal contractor signs it. It becomes useful when the operatives have been briefed against it. The gap between those two events is where most failures happen.
The briefing should happen at the start of the job and again whenever the method changes. It should be face to face. The supervisor walks through the hazards, the controls, the sequence, the PPE, and the emergency procedures. The operatives ask questions and sign the record. If anyone cannot sign, they do not start.
For trades who run small teams, the briefing record is also the proof you need if something goes wrong. A signed briefing sheet shows that the operative was made aware of the hazards, the controls, and the safe method. Without it, you are relying on memory in a courtroom.
The supervisor who briefs the team should also be the supervisor named in the RAMS. If a different person briefs, the operatives are being briefed by someone who was not the named competent person. That is a paperwork mismatch that gets flagged on audit.
Common mistakes that get RAMS rejected
Over fifteen years of writing, reviewing and submitting RAMS to principal contractors, the same handful of mistakes come up again and again. Here are the ones that get the most documents rejected.
Recommended videos
Risk Assessment and Method Statement RAMS Training Course
Health and Safety Training
Risk Assessments and Method Statements
Construction Safety Training
Using Dashpivot for Risk Assessment Method Statements (RAMS)
Sitemate
Risk Assessment and Method Statement eLearning Course Overview
eLearning Health and Safety
How to create a Risk Assessment on RAMs App
RAMs App
CDM Documentation: What documents are required?
CDM Compliance
What tradespeople are saying
Frequently asked questions
A risk assessment is legally required under the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. A method statement is not strictly required by name in any single regulation, but the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 effectively require one for construction work where the sequence of operations controls risk. In practice, principal contractors ask for a RAMS as a single bundled document. If you do construction work above a domestic repair call-out, write one.
Long enough to cover the work, short enough to read in a briefing. A simple domestic install might run to four pages. A commercial M&E job might run to fifteen. If your RAMS for a one-day boiler swap is twenty pages, it is too long. If your RAMS for a multi-day commercial fit-out is two pages, it is too short.
You can reuse the template and the generic hazards and controls for your trade. You cannot reuse the site-specific information. Every job has its own site address, its own access, its own interfaces with other trades, its own occupants. Find-and-replace on the cover page is the most common reason a RAMS gets rejected.
A competent person. CDM 2015 does not certify "RAMS writers" specifically. Competence in this context means a person with the knowledge, training and experience to identify hazards in your trade and write safe methods to control them. For most small trades businesses, this is the working principal or a designated supervisor. For larger contractors, it is often a NEBOSH or IOSH-qualified health and safety manager.
The document is only valid if a competent person has reviewed and signed it. AI is a drafting tool. The legal responsibility for the content sits with the named author. Principal contractors are increasingly aware that some submissions are AI-drafted, and the better ones probe the named author to confirm they can defend the document under questioning. If you cannot, do not submit it.
Before every new job, even if the work is similar. At minimum annually for standard templates. After any incident, near-miss, or change in legislation. When the principal contractor's site rules change. A RAMS that has not been reviewed in eighteen months is, in practice, no RAMS at all.
The construction phase plan is the principal contractor's document for the whole project. It sits above all the individual trade RAMS. Your RAMS describes how your trade will work safely; the construction phase plan describes how all the trades coordinate. You submit your RAMS to the principal contractor, who folds the relevant content into the construction phase plan.
My verdict
A RAMS that the engineer cannot brief in five minutes on the van is too long. A RAMS that does not mention the actual site is too generic. A RAMS that has not been signed by every operative before they start work has not done its job. Write it for the people doing the work, in the language of the people doing the work, and review every output the way you would review a quote you were about to send a client.
AI tools will keep getting better at drafting structure. They will not get better at understanding your site. That is the part that stays human, and that is the part you cannot delegate.
