Emergency procedures on site: what every RAMS needs

Emergency procedures on site are the part of a RAMS everyone copies from a template and nobody reads until something goes wrong. When someone takes a fall or a disc grinder starts a fire, the first two minutes run on what people can actually remember. If your RAMS says nothing beyond "follow the site emergency procedures", that's not a plan. That's a shrug.

This guide covers what the emergency section of your RAMS needs to say, whatever size of job you're on. It slots into the wider document covered in our guide on how to write RAMS for construction work. The aim is simple: a new starter could follow your arrangements on a Monday morning without being told what to do.

What Emergency Procedures on Site Mean in a RAMS

An emergency section isn't a site-wide crisis management course. It's the arrangements for the work you're doing and the people doing it: what happens when someone is badly hurt, when something catches fire, when the ground gives way or the power needs killing in a hurry.

HSE guidance on workplace emergencies tells you to plan for exactly the events construction throws up: serious injuries, fire, explosion, flood, poisoning and electrocution. Your RAMS is where those plans get written down for your work, so the people on the job know them before they need them.

Site Emergency Plan vs Your RAMS

Who provides what depends on the project. Where there's a principal contractor, the site-wide arrangements live in the construction phase plan. That plan must set out the fire and emergency procedures and the site rules, and it's the basis for communicating them to everyone on site.

Your RAMS doesn't rebuild all of that. It plugs into it. State where your muster point is, who your first aider or appointed person is, and how your work affects the site arrangements. If you're doing hot works, blocking a corridor or digging across an evacuation route, say so, and say what happens instead.

Where you're the only contractor on the project, the construction phase plan is your job too. On small jobs the plan and the RAMS often end up as the same few pages, and that's fine. What matters is that the emergency arrangements exist somewhere people can actually find them.

Why Generic Template Wording Fails

"Follow all site emergency procedures" is the line you get in most generic templates. On a principal contractor's site it at least points at something real. Everywhere else it points at nothing, because there is no site emergency procedure until you write one.

The second version takes five minutes to write and works without a site induction. It names people, places and the order of calls. That's the standard to aim for: specific enough that a new starter could act on it on day one.

The Five Things Every RAMS Needs

Whatever the site size, five things belong in the emergency section. Scale them up or down, but don't drop them. The emergency section in RAMS Builder has fields for first aid, fire procedure, spill procedure and your nearest A&E, so those are covered as you build. The alarm, emergency contacts and reporting chain you'll need to add in your own words. The general builder RAMS page shows the kind of detail a builder's RAMS should cover.

Raising the Alarm

State how the alarm gets raised for your work. HSE guidance says to plan how the alarm will be raised and how the emergency services get called. On a noisy site, a phone in someone's pocket isn't an alarm. Write the actual method: a shout, an air horn, a long blast on the van horn. Then say what happens next: tools down, machines off where you safely can, and out by the agreed route to a place of safety.

First Aid Arrangements

Your RAMS needs to record three things about first aid: who the first aider is, where the kit is, and how help gets summoned. That person is either a trained first aider or an appointed person. Under the Health and Safety (First-Aid) Regulations 1981, employers have to provide adequate and appropriate first aid equipment, facilities and personnel. HSE's first aid at work guidance says the minimum on any work site is a suitably stocked first aid kit, someone appointed to take charge of first aid arrangements, and information for employees about those arrangements.

An appointed person doesn't need first aid training. They look after the kit and call the emergency services when required. Whether you need a trained first aider depends on your first aid needs assessment: the work, the site, the numbers and how far you are from help. The RAMS itself just needs the name, the number, the kit location and how help gets summoned.

Evacuation Routes and Muster Points

Write the route and the muster point into the RAMS, and make sure both exist in real life. CDM 2015 Regulation 31 requires emergency routes and exits that lead as directly as possible to an identified safe area and are kept clear. On a house refit that might be "out the front door, assemble on the pavement by the van". On a bigger site it's the principal contractor's marked routes. Either way, name the muster point so people can find it, and check the route daily: stored materials and open excavations eat routes.

Count heads at the muster point. If someone's missing, tell the emergency services or the site controller when they arrive. Don't send people back in to look.

Emergency Contacts

Put the contacts on the site notice board, not in an office file or someone's phone. For a small job the usual list is short:

• Site manager or supervisor, with a mobile number
• First aider or appointed person, with a mobile number
• Client or their agent
• Utility emergency contacts for the services you're working near

Anything life-threatening is 999, or 112 from a mobile. Add the utility numbers to the contact sheet when you set the job up, and check they're current. Don't rely on anyone remembering them mid-incident.

The Reporting Chain

Write the chain in order: who to tell on site first, where the incident gets recorded, then the near misses. Something like: "Any incident: make the area safe, tell the site manager straight away, record it the same day in the accident book or incident log. Near misses go in the log too. They're the free lesson." An accident book is a legal requirement for employers with 10 or more employees, and good practice for everyone else.

Some incidents must also be reported to the enforcing authority under RIDDOR: work-related deaths, specified injuries, certain dangerous occurrences and over-seven-day injuries. The deadlines differ, so don't try to memorise them. Our RIDDOR reporting requirements guide sets out what's reportable, by whom and by when.

Here's the emergency section as a checklist. Lift it into your next RAMS and fill it in for the actual job.

Scaling It to the Job

The five essentials don't change with the size of the job. The detail does. CDM 2015 Regulation 30 says the arrangements must take account of the type of work, the site's size, the equipment, the number of people likely to be present and the substances on site. That's the scaling rule in one sentence. Here's how it looks at each end.

Small Sites and Domestic Work

On a small site or a domestic refit there's usually no site emergency plan beyond your RAMS. That makes your RAMS the emergency plan: the appointed person, the kit in the van or site hut, the muster point at the gate, 999, and somewhere to record incidents. Write it for two or three people, not for a workforce. Our guide to RAMS for domestic work covers what still applies when the job is someone's home.

On the flip side, a domestic job is still a workplace and the duty still follows you. You don't need a cardboard muster point or a laminated contact sheet for a bathroom refit, but the two of you on the job need to know where the first aid kit lives and what number gets dialled if the worst happens. Write it down somewhere a worker can see it, and don't skip recording incidents just because it feels like overkill.

The rule for the small job is the same as for the big one, just scaled: name the people, name the place, keep the route clear, and make sure everyone on the job knows it before they start.

Lone and Mobile Workers

If you work alone or your people are spread across a site, the emergency arrangements change shape. There's often no mate on hand to raise the alarm, so the plan has to cover how help gets called when you can't phone for yourself. That's a job the RAMS has to answer honestly: a check-in call, a two-way radio, a lone worker device, or agreed intervals where someone raises it if you go quiet.

The same applies to mobile work where the "site" moves every day. The emergency section should name who to contact, how they're reached, and what triggers a response when contact is lost. Our guide on lone worker safety digs into the checks and communication plans in more detail.

Briefing the Team So It Actually Works

Writing the emergency section is only half the job. If nobody's been told it, it's a document nobody acts on when it counts. CDM and the safety rules insist people must be familiar with the arrangements, and that means more than handing them the RAMS and hoping they read it.

Walk the new starter through it on day one: where the kit is, how the alarm is raised, where they'd go. Run it into a toolbox talk when something on the job changes that affects the route, the contacts or the muster point. Put the key details on the site notice board so they're visible without a single conversation. And record the briefing: who attended, what date, what changed. That record is what shows an inspector the arrangements actually reached people.

Testing matters too. Emergency arrangements need to be exercised from time to time, not just written down. On a small job that might be a quick walk-through of the route and the muster point with whoever's on site. On a larger site it's part of the wider plan the principal contractor runs. The point is the same: an arrangement nobody's practised is an arrangement nobody trusts.