5 Benefits of Construction Inspection Software [+10 Checklists]

Beyond the day-to-day tasks of managing construction operations, safety and quality control remain top of mind. It’s not only necessary to ensure that sites are safe and secure for your team but also that the structural quality of builds and assignments are being consistently met.

‍

Why successful construction teams conduct regular inspections

Regular construction inspections and walkthroughs help to create a system of accountability around project outcomes and aid in risk prevention, quality control, and general safety. Inspections ensure teams are following protocols, zoning requirements, and safety procedures effectively. But even inspections themselves can become hard to track and maintain on active projects or across widespread construction sites. 

In the past, teams have utilized analog methods of inspection: clipboard walkthrough checklists, binders of standard operating procedures, paper inspection procedures that are later paper-clipped together and stored in file cabinets and drawers. These means of tracking work great to maintain physical copies of activity and support teams when technology is inaccessible due to power or service outages. 

But these analog methods also leave a lot of room for miscommunication and missing information, and paper documents and binders aren’t always accessible when your team is widespread or scattered across various sites. That’s where construction inspection software can help to provide clarity. Modern digital solutions help to not only simplify inspection procedures, they also provide one location for important documents and SOPs and allow managers and team leads to set expectations, track goals and improve quality and safety over time. 

What is construction inspection software? 

Construction inspection software allows teams to manage and conduct inspections within a digital system that maintains clear audit trails and records. Digital inspection software allows for data-driven, long-term tracking and provides a means for teams to log inspection information from a designated computer or mobile device. 

Helpful solutions do this by providing customizable digital checklists that teams can work through to complete inspection criteria based on their team’s standard operating procedures. Beyond safety and quality control, construction inspection software is used for punch lists and snagging to track outstanding requirements and work that still needs to be completed. 

It’s also used for tracking and planning general equipment maintenance for assets such as electric tools, construction vehicles, and other machinery. With construction inspection software, teams can quickly get an understanding of new or upcoming maintenance needs and better plan for preventative maintenance and equipment replacement. 

What types of inspections do construction teams conduct?

Project Management Inspections

Construction teams have a variety of inspection needs depending on the project. Construction processes such as building a structural foundation, putting in drywall, installing electrical or plumbing systems, checking gas lines, and putting in flooring all require adequate inspection to ensure everything meets existing standards of quality and safety. Inspections also help prove that construction elements are secure and up to specific building codes or zoning requirements.  

Equipment Safety Inspections

Construction equipment often requires inspection, too. Tools like electric saws and drills, ladders, construction vehicles, scaffolding, and other heavy machinery require regular technical inspections and sometimes specialized maintenance. Keeping track of what state equipment is in helps teams to better anticipate—and even occasionally prevent—large maintenance costs. Being able to better plan for big fixes or asset replacement allows you to stay on track with budgetary goals to improve your overall bottom line. 

Regular maintenance inspections can include working through a list of equipment and checking it for specific pass/fail actions, inspecting that equipment has been properly stored, ensuring that tools and machinery are fully operational according to product manuals and technical specifications, and more. Having a construction inspection software to properly work through these kinds of checks creates a clear system for maintenance planning and provides a detailed log of inspection activity and asset health so you can quickly identify patterns and improve maintenance processes over time. 

Aspects of a good construction inspection software

The right construction inspection software should work for your team—it should either already be built in a way that supports your team’s preferred working style OR it should be flexible enough that digital processes can be tailored for your team’s usage.

📝 Pre-Built, Customizable Inspection Checklist Library

Solid inspection solutions, like Xenia, provide a library of checklists that you can use as starting points for your construction inspection tasks. Ideally any software you select should also allow for multiple response types on inspection fields, meaning your team could respond on inspection checklists with numbers, pass/fail responses, text, and/or checkboxes. Having multiple response options in inspection fields provides a way for your team to more accurately track inspection details. For example, if the inspection is to check the operational safety of an electric saw, you might have pass/fail responses for each aspect of the saw that needs to be inspected prior to usage being approved.

📸 Attach Photos and Notes on Each Step of the Inspection

Some digital solutions contain the ability to attach or embed photos on individual inspection items or within inspection checklists too, which can be helpful in providing specific visual confirmation or further clarity. Images are crucial to creating punch lists to close out a project, or to catalog damages and issues. Xenia provides easy access to your photo library and in-phone camera to log issues in seconds.

🔎 Track Inspections with Task Management and Progress Status

Software systems like Xenia offer task management in addition to inspection checklists and tracking. This allows your tasks to be linked to inspection items and for tasks to be created directly from inspection checklists so you can easily create and manage last minute work orders, maintenance needs, equipment fixes, and more. This way nothing slips between the cracks, and your entire team has a single source of truth for every construction action. 

📲 Communicate Seamlessly during Inspections without a Radio

Finally, the addition of digital communication tools is an added bonus some inspection solutions boast. Software systems like Xenia include instant messaging features for quick collaboration and immediate communication. Regardless of location, team members can reach out with questions, comments, or concerns immediately via one-on-one messages or group chats. And team managers and leaders can announce important updates, initiatives, and news via public feeds to disperse information across sites and departments. 

Benefits of Construction inspection software 

💰 Save Time and Money

The biggest benefit of construction inspection software is ultimately the savings in time and money. Tracking inspections digitally keeps you from spending hours or even days responding to and managing sudden maintenance or safety issues. Instead, you’ll be prepared to budget both time and money to ensure safety problems are addressed, quality standards, and maintenance needs are properly planned for before a problem occurs. Some software like Xenia include analytics features that make data analysis and pattern recognition even simpler to view and understand, too, so you can spot repeat issues faster and plan for the future.

🖥️ Centralize Your Data for Compliance and Reference

Maintenance software also improves clarity and communication with centralized data. Your entire team can find procedural steps, asset details, assignment notes, and other necessary information needed to complete work effectively and efficiently—all in one place. With a solution like Xenia, you’ll also have the benefit of digital messaging. You may even be able to do away with noisy radios and unplanned phone calls altogether, reducing the need for back and forth.  Having a centralized hub for work processes, inspection logs, and digital communications keeps your team on the same page, regardless of location. 

🦺 Improved Safety and Quality Control

And as we’ve seen: with the right construction inspection solution, you’ll be able to improve overall safety and quality across your operation. Your team will be able to better focus with everything they need to understand inspection tasks accessible with just a few taps of their fingers. And with the ability to analyze checklist data, you can better understand safety failings and make improvements to aid in further risk prevention. 

📲 Remotely Assign and Track Progress

No matter where you and your team are located—spread out across a single site or segmented across several locations—with a construction inspection software like Xenia you’re able to remotely assign work and track progress. So you’ll always be able to see what stage work is in, who is actively working on it, and where there’s room for improvement. Whether you’re actively with your team or supervising multiple sites, you’ll get an overview of all work in real time.

📊Detailed Reports and Analytics

To top it all off: the right construction inspection software will save all that data about tasks, assignments, assets, and inspections so it can be filtered through detailed analytics reports. This helps you to quickly spot patterns, plan for future inspections, and make process improvements where necessary. Xenia offers a robust analytics suite with flexible reports and filters that allow you to take a deep dive into inspection data anytime.

10 Construction Inspection Checklists to Improve your Operation

Here are 10 construction inspection checklists to help get you started improving your inspection operations. You can use these checklists as a starting point by uploading them into your digital inspection solution and editing them to fit your team’s SOP requirements and workflow. 

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

‍

Use Xenia to centralize checklists and more

Xenia is a friendly operations management solution for the deskless workforce and beyond—our solution contains robust yet simple-to-use construction inspection features that allow your team to track and manage inspections in the way that works best for you. Our app is fully customizable, so you can tailor your experience to your SOPs, workflow, and communication style. And you can use Xenia from our accessible desktop or mobile application, so your team can analyze and complete work from the office or on-the-go, no matter how dispersed.

With Xenia, you can create a single source of truth for everything from inspections and maintenance tasks to work orders and safety walkthroughs. And with automatic logs for every task, project, initiative, and asset, you’ll increase communication, improve productivity, and provide added clarity across teams and sites. Xenia allows you to condense every data file, inspection binder, and checklist so it fits in the palm of your hand, creating full access to necessary documents and standard operating procedures. 

And that’s just the beginning of how Xenia can help streamline your construction operations. Schedule a free demo to learn more about how Xenia can take your construction management to the next level.