Denaploy's Latest O&M Manual News

Over the last 10 years we estimate that we have documented over £2bn of construction projects for many main contractors and some of the most demanding clients and consultants in the country.

When any significant building work is undertaken, either as a NewBuild, a Cat A refit (of the basic structure) or a Cat B refit (tenants fittings), it is a legal requirement in the UK that an O&M (Operations and Maintenance) manual be provided as part of the Health & Safety documentation for the building.

It is not only the O&M manuals that are going digital. It is the user guides for apartments too. The requirements of companies such as Paradigm are increasingly to provide detailed bespoke manuals for each apartment.

Clients with large property portfolios are increasingly determined to take control of the documentation relating to their properties and store them in data base silos with a common access and structure

O&M manuals have a terrible reputation. If you mention them to most people in the construction industry you’ll be met by a resigned shrug. They are considered a painful legal necessity and an afterthought to the main job of getting the building project completed. Nobody likes doing them and it requires a completely different skill set to those normally expected of a project manager.

Small Projects in the region of £200k+ can be really difficult for documentation. They are big enough to require careful documentation, but too small to justify the cost involved.

Denaploy are pleased to announce that we have moved our entire Operations & Maintenance Manuals department into new offices.

Is it worth the cost? It's a no-brainer justifying our O&M services.

End of Project check list Having put together all the O&M information from all the subcontractors, there are several areas that need to be cross-checked, especially for the inclusion in the H&S file.

Modern O&M manuals are created as digital documents replete with hyper links, search tools and the type of navigation structures that we have become used to when browsing the internet. Denaploy is one of the leaders in this trend and as a consequence has documented approaching £1bn of construction projects for some of the most demanding customers in the industry.

The final As Built drawings have always been a critical part of an O&M Manual, and it has always been clear that these need to be the final version of the drawings

People have a right to expect good quality documentation explaining how to use and maintain their property and the old way of throwing a few bits of product literature into a file is no longer acceptable.

This page is dedicated to the construction blooper. It's just a bit of fun and not to be taken too seriously

If you recommend someone to us that you think may be interested in supplying us with an O&M manual project and they complete a project agreement we will give you one of these great boys toys absolutely free (while stocks last).

One of the reasons O&M manuals are so disparaged is that they are never there when you need them!

Advice to Project managers - 3 Steps to good quality O&M manuals

Creating a comprehensive, accurate, and user-friendly Operations and Maintenance (O&M) manual is a critical part of any construction or engineering project. Historically, many project managers fall into the trap of leaving the documentation process until the final stages, treating it as an afterthought in the rush to handover.

Our objective is not to create great literature – many manuals are longer than War & Peace. Our aim is to capture large amounts of detail so that any of the wide variety of future users can find what they need whether it be the details of a floor tile that needs replacing following an accident with some inks, or a major overhaul of the Air conditioning.

Since CDM 2007 there has been an increasing emphasis on providing a residual risks section in the health and safety Manual. Some sub-contractors find this particularly confusing because of the apparent similarity with the risk assessment that they are required to make before they start work.

One of our clients is a company that builds and fits-out high-end, exclusive homes in some of the most exclusive areas of North London. They approached us to create the O&M manual and User Guide for one of their latest luxury homes for a well-known TV personality who has a penchant for Apple products.

A new school built by Laing O’Rourke in record time using Laing O’Rourke’s model for delivering primary and secondary schools, using standardised building components manufactured and assembled at Europe’s leading construction offsite pre-assembly facility