The guide

What "completed" means

A job marked "done" can mean many things: the contractor left, the work was tested, the resident is happy, or somebody closed the ticket to tidy the list. A good record says which.

Most repair systems have a status field, and when the contractor reports the work as done, that field turns green. The trouble starts later. The resident writes that the leak is back. The owner asks what was actually replaced. Another contractor comes and finds the same fault. Nobody can tell from the record what was claimed, what was checked, and what the resident ever said.

Open Repair Record answers one question for every closed job:

Who says what

The core idea is to keep each source of information separate. A contractor's statement, a coordinator's check and a resident's answer are different things, with different weight. A record that merges them into one "done" loses exactly the information people need when something goes wrong.

• The contractor says what they did and what they believe the outcome is.
• A check says who looked, how (a test run, a measurement, a photo), what they found, and what they did not cover.
• The resident says whether the problem they reported is solved, in their view. Or they say nothing, and the record says that too.
• The coordinator decides to close the record, and says why.

A quick test for any completion report

Before you close a job, the report should let a stranger answer these questions:

1. What was reported, where, and when?
2. Who says the work is done, and what exactly did they do?
3. Was anything checked? By whom, how, and what did the check not cover?
4. What did the resident say? If nothing, were they asked, and when?
5. Is anything left to do? Who owns it, and by when?
6. Who closed the record, and for what reason?

If any answer is "I don't know", the report is not wrong, it is just incomplete. The builder shows you which parts are missing before you send it.

What this is not

A repair record documents claims and checks. It is not a safety certificate, an inspection, or a legal sign-off, and it does not replace any inspection or certificate your local rules require. A resident's "it's fixed" confirms what they see; it says nothing about the safety of the equipment. A photo shows what it shows. The record is useful precisely because it is honest about these differences.