Tracking to close-out

A defect list is only useful while it is being worked down. These are the tools that keep it moving.

Fixed and disputed

Every defect shows one status:

Status	Means
Open	Still to be fixed
Supplier says fixed	The supplier marked it fixed on the link you emailed them - check it, then tick it
Disputed	You gave it a dispute reason, or the supplier disputes it
Fixed	You ticked it

Fixed — the work has been done. Click the tick at the end of the row (or Mark as fixed inside the defect). Click it again to reopen it. The bar at the top of the page shows the percentage fixed.

Disputed — you do not accept it is a defect. Open it and choose a reason under Disputed because.

Working the list down

The chips along the top each carry a count, so you can see what is left before you click. Grouped by supplier, every trade gets a heading with its own progress bar — thirteen for the painter, three of them fixed.

The chips across the top show one kind of defect at a time: Open, Disputed, Fixed, and - once you send supplier notices - Supplier says fixed, No reply 7+ days and Not sent to supplier. Each shows how many there are. Click Open and the list is what is left. That is the view to work from — a 90-item list that is 70% complete is dispiriting to read in full and perfectly manageable as 27 remaining items. Click All when you need the whole record.

Group by (next to the search box) splits the list by location, room, supplier or status, with a small bar showing how much of each group is fixed. Click a group’s heading to collapse or expand it, or use Collapse all / Expand all; the page remembers which groups you closed. The grid button beside it shows the defects as photo cards - handy on a walk-through with the client. On a phone the list and the photo cards scroll under a fixed toolbar (photos two to a row); the location, room and supplier filters sit behind the funnel button.

No grouping puts the list back to one flat run, and Clear filters takes every filter off at once — worth knowing when a list looks suspiciously short and you cannot see why.

To change many at once, tick them (Shift-click ticks a run) and use the bar that appears: Mark fixed, Reopen, give them a supplier, location or room, or Delete.

Disputing

Some items on a client’s or inspector’s list are not defects. Normal timber movement, something within tolerance, wear from the client’s own use, or something that was never in the contract.

Dispute records that position rather than leaving the item open forever.

Write the reason in the note, plainly and without argument:

Hairline shrinkage crack to cornice, 0.4mm. Within normal tolerance for the first 12 months. Will be reviewed at the end of the maintenance period.

A disputed item still needs a conversation

Marking something disputed records your position; it does not resolve it. Tell the client why, at the time, and in the same plain language. A dispute they find out about by reading a report is a dispute that escalates.

Verify before marking fixed

Do not mark a defect fixed because a trade said they had done it.

Check it, or have the supervisor check it. A defect marked fixed and not fixed reappears at the client’s final inspection, which is the worst possible moment — it costs you credibility on every other item you marked fixed.

Chasing trades

Send each supplier their list with Notify supplier (see supplier notices), or print one list per supplier. Leave the supplier column out controls whether the supplier is shown on a printed list, which matters for the client’s copy.

A useful cadence in the defects period:

When	Do
Inspection day	Log everything, with photographs
Same day	Send each trade their list
Weekly	Chase what is outstanding
Before the client’s re-inspection	Verify everything marked fixed

When the same defect keeps appearing

A trade producing the same defect across several rooms, or across several jobs, is a pattern rather than a series of accidents.

Worth raising with them directly, and worth noting on their supplier record. It is exactly the kind of thing you want to remember at the next tender.

The maintenance period

Most residential contracts carry a defects liability or maintenance period after handover, during which the client can report further defects.

Keep the list open through it. Items reported during the period are logged the same way, and having them in the same place as the handover list means the whole history of the job’s defects is in one document.