Journal
When the accepted programme and the site diary disagree
Site diaries are written at the end of a long day. Programmes are updated in an office, sometimes by someone who was not on the pour. When they disagree about whether a slab was struck on the Thursday or the Monday, the progress pack is the wrong place to settle blame.
We put both dates on the timeline and name the sources. If the diary is silent, we say it is silent. Filling the gap with a memory from a phone call belongs in an email, not in the issued pack.
Look-ahead programmes are especially prone to this. A three-week look-ahead that never matched the accepted logic will still be printed for the trades. Our period packs stay with the accepted programme unless the contract administrator has issued a revision. If the look-ahead is the only thing the gang is working to, we record that as a fact of site practice.
Weather records from the nearest Met Office station are useful when the diary says ‘wet’ and the programme assumed a full week. We use published records, not a screenshot from a phone app, and we state the station.
The aim is a pack a later reader can audit. If we had to choose between a tidy story and a visible disagreement, we keep the disagreement on the page.