Construction support
Construction progress documentation for USVI jobsites.
A dated, navigable record of the site as it actually was — so a change order, a delay claim, or a question about what is behind a wall is answered with the record instead of with recollection. The value is not that the imagery is impressive. It is that the record exists, and that it is still there when someone finally needs it.
What this covers
Six arguments this record ends.
None of them are about photography. Every one is about whether anyone can show what was true on a particular date.
This is the one deliverable on the site bought mostly by people who will never open a DWG. Owners, project managers, and construction counsel buy it because the alternative to a record is somebody’s memory, and memory loses. Where the question needs a measurement rather than a view, that is drone survey.
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Differing site conditions
What was on the ground, and under it, before you mobilized. A pre-existing conditions capture taken before the first machine arrives is the cheapest insurance on the job, and it is only available once.
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Change orders and scope
What was actually in place on the date the change was directed. The argument is rarely about the contract language. It is usually about the state of the work when the direction landed.
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Delay and schedule claims
Progress at dated intervals, captured the same way each time. A dated series captured the same way each time is a different kind of record from a folder of phone photos taken whenever somebody remembered.
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Concealed and covered work
In-wall and above-ceiling conditions, recorded in the days before cover. After the board goes up, every remaining way to answer the question is destructive, expensive, or both.
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Lender draw and owner reporting
Progress against the draw schedule, dated to the draw. An off-island owner or lender can verify what they are funding without flying down, and without taking it on trust.
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Insurance and post-storm
Condition before and after a named event, captured from the same positions, so the comparison is like for like rather than an argument about which angle the photo was taken from.
| The argument | The question it turns on | The capture that supplies it |
|---|---|---|
| Differing site conditions | The state of the site before you touched it | Pre-existing conditions capture, dated before mobilization |
| Change order scope | What was in place on the date of the direction | The dated capture nearest that date |
| Delay claim | Rate of progress across a period, measured the same way each time | The interval series, captured from fixed positions |
| Concealed work | What is behind the finish | Pre-cover interior capture, taken before close-up |
| Lender draw dispute | Completion against the draw schedule on the draw date | Milestone capture tied to the draw |
| Insurance or storm loss | Condition immediately before and after the event | The last routine capture, plus a post-event capture from the same positions |
What makes a record reliable
Four properties.
Everything else is decoration.
A site record is worth something to the extent that someone can rely on it long after the job closed without having to take your word for anything. That comes down to four things, and none of them are resolution.
- Dated. Every capture carries the date it was taken. A record that cannot be placed on a timeline answers no question anybody is actually asking.
- Delivered as captured. Not retouched, not brightened, not cropped to the part that looks finished. The moment a record has been improved, its value as a record is gone.
- Complete for the areas covered. Systematic coverage on a route, rather than the frames somebody chose to keep. Selected imagery invites the obvious question about what was not kept, and that is a difficult question to answer well.
- Retained and retrievable. Held for the period agreed at proposal, and findable by date and location when it is needed — which is the point at which nobody has time to hunt for it.
Questions to ask any vendor
- On dating
- How is the capture date recorded, and can it be shown independently of the file name?
- On alteration
- Is anything adjusted after capture, and is that stated?
- On coverage
- Is the route systematic, or is somebody choosing the frames?
- On retention
- Who holds it, for how long, and what happens if you stop paying them?
Capture cadence
What a skipped week costs.
The cost of a gap is not the missed capture. It is that the gap will turn out, later and with perfect timing, to be exactly the week something got covered up.
Cadence should be set against the work rather than against a price list. Two questions settle it: how quickly does this site conceal its own work, and what is the longest period you could stand to have no record of? A fit-out closing walls every week answers differently from a site works package.
The one interval that is not negotiable is the first. A pre-existing conditions capture has to happen before mobilization, because after that it is no longer available at any price.
What is viewable, and by whom
The people who need it are rarely on site.
An owner two time zones away, a lender approving a draw, and an attorney reading in long after the fact all need the same record, and none of them will install anything to see it.
| Capture | What it covers | Who typically needs it |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-existing conditions | The site and adjacent property before mobilization | Owner, GC, counsel |
| Exterior progress | Envelope, site works, laydown, and access routes | GC, owner, lender |
| Interior progress | Rooms, corridors, shafts, and ceiling voids | GC, subcontractors, counsel |
| Pre-cover capture | In-wall and above-ceiling conditions before close-up | GC, counsel, insurer |
| Milestone capture | The site tied to a named milestone or draw date | Lender, owner |
| Post-event capture | Condition after a storm or incident, from the same positions | Insurer, owner, counsel |
Access is a commercial question as much as a technical one, and it is worth settling before the first capture rather than during a dispute. Who on the project can open the record, whether the owner’s counsel is on the list from the start, and what happens to access at project close are all decided at scoping and written into the proposal.
Where the requirement is a dimensioned model of what was recorded rather than a view of it, that is scan to BIM. Where it is measurable ground rather than interior condition, see aerial mapping.
Retention
The record has to outlive the job.
Construction disputes do not surface on the construction schedule. They surface when a latent defect appears, when a certificate is challenged, or when somebody finally reads the file — which is routinely years after the last person left the site.
So we publish no default retention period, and that is a position rather than an omission. The right period depends on your contract, your exposure, and how long you actually need the record to be there — and those differ far too much between an owner with one villa and a contractor carrying a public works package for any bundled figure to be right for both. Retention is a scoped line item, agreed and priced at proposal. We would rather quote it honestly than include a period that quietly expires while you assume it has not.
How the period gets set
- Default period
- None. There is no bundled figure to quietly expire on you
- Set by
- You, with your counsel, against the contract and the exposure rather than the build schedule
- Priced as
- A scoped line item in the proposal, per job
- Written where
- Into the agreement, before the first capture
Where we work
Territory jobs, off-island stakeholders.
The recurring pattern here is distance: the people carrying the risk on a USVI project are very often not in the USVI.
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St. Thomas
Dense Charlotte Amalie building stock and constrained sites where adjacent-property condition matters as much as your own. On a tight lot the pre-existing capture of what is next door is the one people wish they had.
Documentation on St. Thomas → -
St. Croix
Larger industrial and institutional projects, longer programmes, and more parties on the contract. More parties means more positions to reconcile later, and a dated series is what reconciles them.
Documentation on St. Croix → -
St. John
Villa and resort work with owners who are almost never on island. Barge-dependent logistics also mean a delay narrative gets contested more often, and a dated record is what settles the sequence.
Documentation on St. John →
Questions we get
Before the first capture.
How often do you capture?
On the interval your risk actually sits on, which is usually either the pay period or the schedule milestones, not a number we picked.
The useful test is simple: what is the longest gap you could live with having no record of? On a fit-out where walls close weekly, that answer is short. On a site works package it may be monthly. We would rather set the cadence against the work than sell you a frequency.
How do we view it?
The record is delivered so that someone who is not on the project team can open it and walk the site without training and without specialist software. That is the whole point of the format: an owner, a lender, or an attorney should not need a CAD seat to see what was there.
The viewer and the access arrangement are named in the proposal, so you know before the first capture who will be able to open it and how.
How long is it kept?
There is no default period, and that is deliberate. Retention is written into the agreement rather than inherited from whatever some platform defaults to, because on this deliverable retention is the product.
It is a scoped line item, agreed and priced per job. The period is yours to set with your counsel, because it is a legal and commercial question rather than a technical one, and it varies far too much between projects for a bundled figure to be right. The only thing we would put to you is that a record deleted at substantial completion is not there for the disputes that surface later. Tell us what you need to hold and for how long, and it is priced and written into the agreement.
Does it work for interiors?
Interiors are where it earns its keep. Exterior progress is visible to anyone standing on the site; what is behind a closed wall is not, and it is the second category that generates argument.
Interior capture covers rooms, corridors, shafts, and ceiling voids, and the capture worth paying for is the one taken in the days before cover. Once the board goes up, the only remaining ways to answer a question about what is behind it are destructive or expensive. Where the answer needs to be a dimensioned model rather than imagery, that is scan to BIM.
Can it be used in a claim?
That is a question for your counsel, and any vendor who answers it with an unqualified yes is selling you something. We are not attorneys and this page is not legal advice.
What we can tell you is what the record is, because that is the part we control: each capture carries the date it was taken, it is delivered as captured, the coverage is systematic rather than selected across the areas covered, and it is retained and retrievable. What weight that carries in any particular matter is for your counsel to assess, on the facts and the forum. Our job is to make sure that when they ask whether the record exists, the answer is yes.
Tell us about the site.
Send the island, the parcel, and what you need out the other end. We’ll come back with a scoped, fixed-fee proposal within one business day.