A free snag list template you can print or fill in on your phone

What each column is for

Every column exists because leaving it out causes a specific failure on site. The order is the order a trade reads it in: where, what, what to do, who.

• Number. Permanent. When item 14 is fixed it stays item 14 with a closed date, it does not become item 12 on the next version. This is the only way a re-inspection can be compared with the original.
• Location. Precise enough to stand alone. “Bedroom 2, window wall, left reveal, 300 mm above the sill” walks someone to the spot. “Bedroom” does not.
• Snag. The factual condition, measured where a tolerance is in play. “Sealant missing to 400 mm of the bath edge at the tap end” rather than “poor sealant”.
• Remedy expected. The column people leave out, and the one that decides whether the fix is done once. “Rake out and reseal full length” removes the argument about what counts as done.
• Trade. A named trade or subcontractor. A list sent to the builder as one block gets read by nobody in particular.
• Priority. High, medium or low, or simply a mark for items that must be finished before completion.
• Photo reference. The number of the photograph on your phone, or the photo file name, so the image can be matched to the row later.
• Status and date closed. Filled in on the re-inspection, by you, not from a photograph the builder sent.

Filling it in on site

Walk the property in a fixed order, ground floor clockwise from the front door, then upstairs, then outside, and inspect one element at a time in each room. Write the location before the snag, because the location is what you forget first. Keep the sheet for each floor separate if the list is long.

Inspect in daylight and in raking light for finishes. Test everything that moves, switches, runs or drains. The room by room list of what to check is in the new build snagging checklist, and the way to word each entry so it gets fixed is in how to write a snagging report.

Where the photos go

This is where a paper list breaks. Every snag needs at least two photographs, a wide one showing where it is and a close one showing what it is, and neither of them fits in a cell. The photo reference column is the workaround: note the photo number from your camera against the row, then match them up when you type the list into a document that evening.

That evening job, matching forty photographs to forty rows and pasting them into a report, is the reason most people stop using the paper template after the second inspection.

The same list on your phone

Site Audit records exactly these columns, with the photographs attached to the row instead of referenced from it. Each snag carries as many captioned photos as it needs, a location, the description, the trade, a priority and a status, and the app generates the finished PDF, a cover, a summary table and a page per snag, before you leave the building.

One complete project is free, including the PDF, which is enough for a house purchase or a single job. Pro is a one time unlock for people who do this every week. There is a real example of the output at the sample snagging report, and the details of what is free at pricing.