If more than one contractor will work on your project, you, as the client, must appoint a principal designer in writing. They plan, manage and monitor the pre-construction phase and coordinate health and safety while the project is designed, so that risks to the people who build, maintain, clean and use the building are designed out or controlled.
When you must appoint
You must appoint a principal designer whenever more than one contractor will be working on the project at any time, or it is reasonably foreseeable that they will. Contractors who work one after another count, so an office fit-out with a main contractor and a separate electrical contractor needs one even if their work never overlaps.
You do not need a principal designer when a single contractor does all the work, although your other duties as a client still apply.
If you are a domestic client, having work done on your own home and not for a business, you do not make the appointment.
Appoint early
Make the appointment as soon as practicable and, in any event, before the construction phase begins. HSE advises appointing as early as possible in the design process and, where practicable, at the concept stage, because design decisions made in the pre-construction phase have a significant influence on how safely the project can be built and used.
Keep the appointment in place for as long as the role is needed, as design work can continue into the construction phase. If it ends before the project does, the principal designer must pass the health and safety file to the principal contractor.
Choose who to appoint
The principal designer must be a designer with control over the pre-construction phase. CDM 2015 defines a designer as anyone whose business involves preparing or modifying designs for a structure, or arranging for or instructing people under their control to do so. The principal designer can be an organisation or, on smaller projects, an individual. They do not have to carry out design work on your project themselves.
A health and safety consultant whose business does not involve design can advise the team but cannot be appointed.
Check they can do the job
The person you appoint must have the skills, knowledge and experience, and if they are an organisation the organisational capability, to carry out the role. A designer must not accept the appointment unless they do, and you must take reasonable steps to satisfy yourself that they do. HSE expects the level to be proportionate to the complexity of the project and the nature of its risks. That means technical knowledge of the construction industry relevant to your project, and the ability to understand, manage and coordinate the pre-construction phase, including making sure significant and foreseeable risks are managed through the design process.
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Ask for evidence of relevant experience
Ask for examples of projects of a similar type and complexity, and how they coordinated the design team on them. Records of continuing professional development and membership of professional institutions also count.
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Ask how they would coordinate the design on your project
You are looking for a clear approach to getting designers to share risk information and to cooperate with you, the principal contractor and each other.
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Test organisational capability
If you are appointing an organisation, use a pre-qualification assessment from a member of the Safety Schemes in Procurement (SSIP) Forum, or ask them to self-assess against the standard health and safety questions in Build UK's Common Assessment Standard.
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Keep a record of your checks
Note what you asked for, what you received and why you were satisfied. It is your evidence that you took reasonable steps.
Set out what they will do
Under CDM 2015 the principal designer must plan, manage and monitor the pre-construction phase, and identify and eliminate or control foreseeable risks to the people who will build, maintain, clean or use the structure. They must make sure all designers meet their own duties and that everyone working in the pre-construction phase cooperates. They help you provide pre-construction information and pass it to every designer and contractor appointed or being considered. They liaise with the principal contractor and give them what they need for the construction phase plan. They also prepare the health and safety file, keep it up to date and, if they are in post at the end of the project, hand it to you.
Make the appointment in writing
The appointment must be in writing. A letter of appointment, a clause in the designer's terms of engagement or a signed agreement all work. It should say that you are appointing them as principal designer under CDM 2015 for a named project, when the appointment starts and, if known, when it ends, and that they accept the duties in regulations 11 and 12. Keep a copy.
Give them the pre-construction information you hold about the site and the project as soon as you can. If the project is notifiable, the notice you send to HSE must give the principal designer's name and contact details.
Once appointed, the principal designer starts planning the pre-construction phase and, when you appoint a principal contractor, passes on the information they need.
If you do not appoint one
If you do not appoint a principal designer when you need one, you must carry out the principal designer's duties yourself. They include planning and monitoring the pre-construction phase, managing design risks, coordinating the designers, preparing the health and safety file and liaising with the principal contractor. Not appointing does not remove the duties, it passes them to you, and most clients lack the design and construction health and safety expertise to meet them.
Legal basis
Primary legislation and key regulations