The Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015 are the main regulations for managing health and safety on building work in Great Britain. A 'domestic client' is someone having work done on their own home, or a family member's home, that is not in connection with a business.

Who takes on the client duties

Domestic clients are not expected to manage health and safety themselves. Under regulation 7, their duties are carried out instead by:

  • the contractor, where there is only one contractor on the project;
  • the principal contractor, where there is more than one contractor; or
  • the principal designer, if the client agrees this in writing with them.

Where more than one contractor will work on the project, which is the case on almost every extension or refurbishment, a principal designer and a principal contractor must be appointed. If the client does not appoint them, the designer in control of the pre-construction phase becomes the principal designer and the contractor in control of the construction phase becomes the principal contractor.

What the principal contractor does

  • Prepares a construction phase plan before work starts, setting out the site rules and how the significant risks will be managed.
  • Organises and coordinates the work of all the trades, including inductions, welfare, site security and inspections.
  • Consults workers and passes information to the principal designer for the health and safety file.

Notifying HSE

Projects must be notified to HSE on form F10 if the construction work will last longer than 30 working days and have more than 20 workers working at the same time at any point, or will exceed 500 person-days. On domestic projects the duty to notify passes to whoever carries the client duties, as above.

The health and safety file

Where there is more than one contractor, the principal designer prepares a health and safety file and gives it to the client at the end of the project. It records the information needed to carry out future work safely, such as structural principles, hidden services and hazardous materials. See our guide to the health and safety file.