No Paper, No Roof

The problem in one breath

A sub crew you've run for two years pulls into the yard Monday. Somebody asks about his insurance, he says it's all current, he'll email it tonight — and he never does. Five weeks later one of his men comes off a garage roof, the first thing anybody asks you for is what you had on file, and what you have is a text message.

Why it happens

Nobody turns away a crew standing in the yard ready to work. The schedule's tight, the shingles are on site, and paper feels like the office's problem while the roof is the real one. So the certificate gets promised on the phone and nobody chases it. That holds up for years, right until the day it doesn't.

The play

Run the paperwork gate: no sub crew rolls until his paper is on file and the dates are good. It isn't a filing problem — it's your money.

1. Two certificates before the first job. Current workers' comp and general liability from every sub company you use. "He's run for us for years" is not a certificate, and neither is "he's self-employed" — a genuinely self-employed person with no employees isn't covered by the federal OSH Act, but that says nothing about who carries a claim, and it's no cover for you when your own men are working next to a hazard his work created. The gate belongs to the office, not to a foreman on a roof.
2. Take the dates off the certificate, not off the phone call. He isn't lying; he doesn't know what his agent did in March. A certificate shows the state of a policy on the day it was issued, not proof it's alive this morning — ask your own agent what notice, if any, you'd get if it lapsed. Type in what the paper says.
3. One list, with both expiration dates. Every sub company goes on the certificate log, both dates, so a lapse surfaces weeks before the crew is standing in your yard. Read it when you build next week's schedule.
4. Give the chase to one name. A person, not "the office" — he calls the sub and the sub's agent until the renewal certificate is in hand, with that chase on the promise list (Module 2, Play 1).
5. Ask your own agent before the season. Straight out: "If an uninsured sub gets hurt on my job, what happens on my policy, and how do you treat what I paid him at audit?" Write the answer down. Your policy language and your state settle that — not a guess in the middle of the season. And what you end up carrying prices every bid (Module 11, Play 3).

Do this this week

Pull the last two jobs a sub crew worked and check the file on each: both certificates, both dates, both good on the day he was on your roof. Half an hour at the filing cabinet. Every hole gets a phone call before you go home.

The tool

the-certificate-log.xlsx — the certificate log. One row per sub company. You type the two expiration dates off his certificates, and the sheet counts the days left on each and puts a flag in the Flag column: NO PAPER when a date is missing, EXPIRED when one has gone by, EXPIRES SOON inside thirty days. A box at the top counts your crews, how many are missing paper, how many are expired, and how many run out inside thirty days. A yellow example row ships filled in — delete it when your first real crew goes in. the sheet notes below has the formulas and the judgment behind them. Print the card below and tape it where the schedule gets built:

THE PAPERWORK GATE — what the office checks before a sub rolls

Sub company: _____________________________   Checked: __________

[ ] Workers' comp certificate on file      expires: ____________
[ ] General liability certificate on file  expires: ____________
[ ] Dates read off the certificate, not off a phone call
[ ] Both dates cover every day he is on our schedule
[ ] Company on the paper = company on his invoice
[ ] Typed into the log     Chasing it: ______________ (one name)

Any box empty, he does not go on the schedule. Make the call first.

If your crew is 1099

Get this line right. There's a test for whether a man is really a sub, every state runs its own, and it comes down to who is actually running his crew. Asking another company for proof of insurance before you hire it is normal business, and that's all this is — a condition in the contract, like a warranty or a finish date. Using the paper as a handle on his men is different: picking who shows up, setting their hours, running them through your training, disciplining them. That's directing his crew, and it's what can cost you his 1099 standing. Set the outcome, the spec, and the site rules that apply to everyone on your job, then let him run his men.

One more thing: this play is how we run a shop — it's not legal advice. Rules change by state and by contract, so before you act on the legal-sounding parts, run them past your own attorney or accountant. It's your business, and what you do with any of this is your call and your responsibility.