Track construction defects with Claude without losing open actions
Method and example: Track construction defects with Claude without losing open actions. Sources, assumptions and checks before sharing.
By Educasium
Track construction defects with Claude →
A single-family home extension has just been handed over with two reservations: hall paint needing a touch-up, a loose handle in an office. Six weeks later, the contractor announces it has been on site "to sort everything out." Nobody has gone back to check. The client, keen to move on, asks whether the file can be considered closed. Can a reservation be cleared on a contractor's word alone? And more importantly: how much time is left before the right to demand its repair becomes harder to enforce?
A defect register is not a simple checklist: it is the document that tracks, reservation by reservation, the legal window during which a contractor must fix a defect flagged at handover, with no need to start a further procedure to enforce it. A poorly tracked reservation, or one cleared without evidence, deprives the client of a right they thought was preserved.
This article details the legal period protecting each reservation, the difference between a reported intervention and a proven clearance, the method for structuring a register that survives several updates, and the situations where the register alone is not enough.
Summary
- The period that protects each reservation: the making-good warranty
- Open, reported, cleared: do not confuse the statuses
- Structuring a register that stays usable after ten updates
- Updating the register step by step
- When the register is not enough
- What we observe among architects and construction firms
- Training to make defect tracking more reliable
- Frequently asked questions
The period that protects each reservation: the making-good warranty
A reservation recorded in the handover document benefits from a one-year period from handover for the contractor to fix it, under Article 1792-6 of the French Civil Code. This period, the parfait achèvement (making-good) warranty, also covers defects notified in writing after handover, not only those recorded on the day of the visit itself.
A start date that is never inferred from an impression
The period's starting point is not the end-of-site date announced by the contractor, nor the date of the last invoice: it is the handover date recorded in the document, as detailed in our method for preparing the handover record. A reservation opened on 20 September 2025, a fictional example, remains enforceable until 20 September 2026 with no further step needed to assert it within that period.
What the warranty covers, what it does not
The making-good warranty covers defects reserved in the handover document or notified in writing after handover; it does not cover a defect apparent on the day of the visit but not recorded in the document, nor defects falling under the biennale or décennale warranties, whose periods and scope differ. A register that blends these categories without distinguishing them loses much of its usefulness for assessing what remains genuinely enforceable.
Open, reported, cleared: do not confuse the statuses
A contractor announcing it has worked on a reservation has not, by that fact alone, cleared it: clearance requires verification, not a statement. Confusing the two statuses is the most frequent error in an otherwise well-kept register.
Four statuses, four different kinds of evidence
| Status | What it means | Evidence to require before accepting it | Frequent mistake |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open | Defect noted, no action taken yet | None: it is the default status | None |
| Reported intervention | The contractor states it has worked on it | Nothing yet: status stays "open" until checked | Treating the statement as a clearance |
| Cleared | The defect has been checked and fixed on site, by someone other than the contractor | A dated joint inspection, ideally with a photo | Clearing without a revisit |
| To assess (period expired) | The one-year warranty has lapsed for this specific reservation | The actual handover date, not an estimate | Assuming the right is automatically extinguished without checking the file |
Why a reservation not cleared after a year does not vanish on its own
The expiry of the making-good warranty period does not make the defect disappear: it simply makes claiming it more complex, and often dependent on a case-by-case legal analysis. That is one more reason never to let a "reported intervention" status silently turn into "cleared" for lack of follow-up, while the legal clock keeps running in the background.
Structuring a register that stays usable after ten updates
A register that is up to date at the first visit quickly loses its value if it does not survive later updates. Its structure must make it possible to retrieve, at any time, the full history of a given reservation.
A stable ID, never a fresh numbering
Each reservation keeps the same ID from the day of handover through to its actual clearance, even when its description is reworded between two visits. Renumbering rows at every update makes it impossible to reconcile the register with earlier documents — the handover record, visit reports, exchanges with the contractor — and strips away much of the file's evidential value.
Three views, one single source of truth
The register is best structured as three sheets: an exhaustive detail, a summary by status and a breakdown by trade or contractor. The detail remains the reference; the summary and the trade breakdown must be recalculated from it, never rewritten independently, or the number of reservations will differ from one sheet to another.
Updating the register step by step
Step 1: Gather the last approved register and the new dated observations. Without this foundation, no reliable before/after comparison is possible, and an already-cleared reservation risks being reopened by mistake.
Step 2: Check every proposed status change against evidence. A contractor's statement is never, on its own, proof of clearance; a dated inspection, ideally documented with a photo, is.
Step 3: Confirm the actual handover date before calculating any deadline. The register must never recalculate a warranty deadline from an assumed end-of-site date: the only date that matters is the one recorded in the handover document.
Step 4: Recalculate totals in Excel after every change. A row changed without recalculating formulas leaves an outdated summary, invisible until a client or contractor spots the inconsistency.
Step 5: Circulate a dated version and archive the previous one. Keeping the version history makes it possible to reconstruct, in the event of a later dispute, what was known and by what date.
When the register is not enough
A properly kept register does not resolve every situation that can arise after handover.
A reservation not cleared after the one-year period expires does not disappear from the register, but enforcing it now depends on a case-by-case analysis, often with the help of a legal professional: the register documents the situation, it does not settle it. A persistent disagreement between the client and the contractor over whether an intervention actually happened — one asserting it, the other disputing it — is not resolved by a better-formatted table, but by a joint inspection or, failing agreement, an expert assessment. Finally, if the handover date itself is disputed — for instance in the case of an unformalized tacit handover — the starting point of the period must be clarified before labelling a reservation "overdue," or the deadline would rest on an uncertain basis.
What we observe among architects and construction firms
In our exchanges about tracking reservations, the difficulty is almost never understanding the distinction between a reported intervention and a proven clearance: building professionals and architects know it well. What costs time is reformatting the register after every follow-up visit — retrieving the previous file, checking that no reservation was lost along the way, recalculating a summary that must stay consistent with the detail. That is repetitive update work, not a lack of rigor — and it is exactly the kind of task a well-structured register removes, without ever deciding on the professional's behalf whether a reservation can truly be considered cleared.
Training to make defect tracking more reliable
A well-designed register template is not enough on its own: it also needs adapting to every site, over several months, without losing track of a single reservation. For an architect practising as a self-employed professional (NAF code 7111Z in France), the FIFPL fund covers part of the cost of Qualiopi-certified training under 2026 criteria set at €300 per day and €900 per year, with e-learning capped at 50% of the daily rate. This funding must be arranged before training starts, not after.
Frequently asked questions
How long does a reservation remain enforceable after handover?
A reservation recorded in the handover document, or a defect notified in writing after handover, benefits from a one-year period from the handover date for the contractor to fix it, under Article 1792-6 of the Civil Code. After that period, the defect does not legally disappear, but enforcing it becomes more complex and generally depends on a case-by-case analysis. This period runs from the date actually recorded in the handover document, never from an estimated end-of-site date, which makes verifying that date the first step before any deadline calculation.
Does a contractor's reported intervention count as clearing the reservation?
No: a contractor's statement that it has worked on an issue is not, on its own, proof that the defect was corrected. Clearance requires a joint inspection, carried out by someone other than the contractor itself, ideally dated and documented with a photo, before the status can be changed in the register. Until that inspection has taken place, the status must stay "open" in the register, rather than shifting prematurely to "cleared" on the strength of the statement alone.
Should a reservation be reopened if the defect reappears after clearance?
Yes, in most cases: a reservation cleared in error, or a defect that reappears after an incomplete repair, should be re-entered under its original ID rather than created as a new row, to preserve the traceability of its full history since handover. Creating a new row for the same defect would break the link with the earlier exchanges and findings that already documented the problem. The status then reverts to "open," and a new clearance can only be accepted after a fresh, dated joint inspection.
Does the register replace the handover record?
No, the two documents are complementary and do not cover the same thing: the handover record fixes the acceptance decision, with or without reservations, and the date that starts the warranty periods, while the register tracks the handling of each reservation over time through to its actual clearance, long after the record is signed. The handover record is therefore drawn up only once, at handover, whereas the register keeps being updated through follow-up visits. Confusing the two documents risks losing track of a reservation still open several months after the record was signed.
What should be done if the client and the contractor disagree over a clearance?
The disagreement should be documented in the register rather than settled unilaterally by either party: a joint inspection, organized with both parties present, or failing agreement, an expert assessment, remains the appropriate route. Unilaterally changing the status of a disputed reservation, in either direction, would expose whoever did so to having to justify that decision later. While this is being clarified, the reservation should stay marked "to assess" or "open" in the register, rather than being classified ahead of time in a direction favourable to either party.
Reliable defect tracking rests on three elements that do not change from one site to the next: a verified handover date, since it fixes the start of the one-year legal period, a strict distinction between a reported intervention and a proven clearance, and a stable ID per reservation that survives every update. Once that foundation is in place, it is exactly what the defect-register generator applies automatically, while leaving the professional the decision on whether each clearance is genuine.
To document the initial finding behind a reservation, our site visit report method details how to connect an observation to an action, and our handover record guide revisits the document that fixes the starting date of this period.
Training 100% fundable via OPCO/FIFPL. Qualiopi-certified programme. To structure your defect tracking and site documents with AI as part of our AI for architectural management training, contact Educasium and specify your status (employee, self-employed, business owner) and your goal.