The records a trade business needs before it needs them

Four completely different bad days, one identical question.

The van is emptied overnight. A certificate you signed two years ago is challenged. A managing agent asks why a property has no EICR. A site manager will not let you past the gate.

In every case somebody is asking you to prove something — and in every case the proving is either already done or no longer possible. There is very little middle ground and almost no way to catch up afterwards.

This is a guide to the records that decide which side of that line you are on, and roughly what it costs to keep them. It is not a long list.

The pattern underneath all of it

Records that matter share three properties, and it is worth naming them because they explain why so many well-intentioned systems fail.

• They can only be created before the event. A serial number is obtainable while you own the tool. A calibration certificate is obtainable while the instrument is in date. Nothing about the moment of crisis lets you go back.
• They are worth nothing while nothing is wrong. Which is precisely why they do not get kept. There is no feedback, no reward, and no visible consequence — until there is.
• The gap is invisible from inside. A folder of certificates looks complete. A register of ten tools looks like a register. You cannot see an absence by looking at what is present, and that is the failure mode almost every trade business has.

Every specific thing below is an instance of that pattern.

1. What you own

The tool register. Make, model, serial number, what you paid, when, and the receipt.

The failure is not that people do not keep lists — most do. It is that the list answers “what do I own?” when the question on the day is “can you prove this was yours and what it was worth?”. Those need different fields.

Cost to keep: about ninety seconds per tool, at the moment you buy it. Cost to reconstruct afterwards: several evenings with bank statements, and an incomplete answer.

How to build a tool register that is worth something after a theft →

2. What you measured with

Calibration dates, per instrument, by serial number.

A certificate is a claim that you measured something. The instrument is the reason anyone should believe you. Take away current calibration and the reading is not necessarily wrong — it is unevidenced, which is a much weaker place to stand if somebody challenges it later.

The universal failure here is that the due date lives on a sticker on the side of the tester, and you read the sticker at the exact moment when reading it is least useful: while you are already using it.

Cost to keep: recording one date per instrument, and being told about it a month early. Cost of getting it wrong: potentially every certificate issued since it lapsed.

The tester was out of calibration. Now what? →

3. What the property is required to hold

Gas safety record, EICR, EPC, alarm checks — and, critically, the set each property is supposed to have, not just the documents that happen to have arrived.

A shared drive can only list what was uploaded. It has no view about what ought to be there, so it can never show you a gap. And gaps are the entire risk: the certificate that was never created leaves no trace in a system that only records arrivals.

There is a subtler trap too — the document on file with no expiry date recorded. It looks like coverage. It is actually an unknown, and it should never be shown in green.

Cost to keep: defining the required set once per property, then filing each certificate at the moment of issue. Cost of getting it wrong: for electrical breaches in England, government guidance puts local authority financial penalties at up to £40,000.

A folder of certificates cannot tell you which one is missing →

4. What lets you through the gate

Public liability, employers’ liability, competent-person registration, cards and qualifications, waste carrier licence.

This one is different from the other three because the consequence is immediate and mundane rather than eventual and serious: you are turned away, and you lose the morning. The records exist; they are in an email, or a folder on a laptop, or with the person who is on holiday.

The requirement is not really storage. It is retrieval, on a phone, at a gate, frequently with no signal — plant rooms and basements being what they are.

Cost to keep: uploading documents you already have, once, with their expiry dates. Cost of getting it wrong: a wasted day and an awkward call.

What this does not require

It is worth being clear about the scale, because “get your records in order” sounds like a month of work and puts people off starting.

It is not. It is:

• Ten tools, the expensive ones, with four fields each. Twenty minutes.
• One date per measuring instrument. Five minutes.
• The required set defined once per property, then filing at the point of issue rather than later.
• Your existing insurance documents uploaded once, with their renewal dates.

Then the habit: add each thing at the moment you acquire it, when the receipt is in your hand and the serial is on the box in front of you. The whole system is built out of ninety-second decisions taken on ordinary days.

The honest limitation

None of this makes you compliant, and you should be suspicious of anything that claims otherwise. Software tracks documents and dates. The legal duty stays exactly where it was — with the landlord for the property, and with you for the work you certify.

What good records give you is narrower and still valuable: visibility of what is missing while there is time to fix it, and evidence afterwards of what was held and what was chased.

How ServicePay handles it

These four live in one place rather than four.

• The tool and equipment register holds what you own, with serials, receipts, values and location — and flags items with no serial recorded. Calibration sits on the same record, warning 30 days before an instrument is due.
• The stolen-tool report turns that register into the police list and the insurer’s priced schedule in one go. See what to do in the first hour after a break-in.
• Compliance tracking starts from what each property is required to hold, so it shows absences rather than just files, and badges each item by whether the duty comes from law, a standard, guidance or contract.
• Insurance and certificates keeps the gate paperwork with expiry warnings, and the site pass is cached on the phone so it works where there is no signal.
• Anything on a register can carry a scannable tag, and fixed plant on somebody else’s site can carry one too through the site and plant register. We do not charge per asset or per tag, and here is why that matters.

Common questions

What records should a small trade business keep?

Four sets: what you own (tools, with serials, prices and receipts), what you measure with (calibration dates per instrument), what each property you service is required to hold (its certificate set and expiry dates), and your own business paperwork (insurance, registrations, cards) with renewal dates.

Where should records be kept?

Somewhere that is not physically in the van, because a laptop in a van is stolen alongside the tools. Anything cloud-based handles this by default; a spreadsheet emailed to yourself quarterly is a workable minimum.

Is a shared drive enough for certificates?

Not on its own. A drive can list what was uploaded but has no view of what each property ought to hold, so it cannot show you an absence — and absences are the risk.

How long does it take to set this up?

Under an hour for the parts that matter most: the ten most expensive tools, one calibration date per instrument, and your insurance documents. Completeness comes from adding things as you acquire them rather than from a single big session.

Does keeping records make me compliant?

No. Records give you visibility and evidence. The legal duties sit with the landlord for the property and with you for the work you certify, and no software changes that.