RFI, ASI, and CCD get used loosely. A document that changes the work ends up filed like a question, or a question gets treated like an approved change.

This is a practical filing guide, not a contract interpretation. Different jobs use different forms. Some follow AIA-style documents, some use an owner's forms, and some say "bulletin," "field order," or "directive" instead of ASI or CCD. Your contract and the design team's practices govern. When money or time is in dispute, read those documents and talk to a construction attorney. The habit below is how you keep the types straight in the file.

What these usually are

RFI: Request for Information. This is a question. The contractor, or a sub through the contractor, asks the design team to clarify a conflict, a missing detail, or a field condition. A good RFI is numbered, dated, and pointed at a sheet or a spec. A good answer reaches the field. An RFI is not, by itself, a change order. If the answer actually changes the work, the cost, or the time, that change still needs to be captured in the change record your contract uses. File the RFI and the answer together, and put a copy next to the current set if the answer is binding on the work.

ASI: Architect's Supplemental Instruction. On many jobs, this is an instruction or clarification issued by the architect. In some standard form contracts, ASIs are used for instructions that are not expected to change the contract sum or the time. That is not a promise an ASI will never affect money or time. If an ASI clearly adds work or affects the schedule, treat it as a document that may need a change process. File ASIs with the current set, not in email.

CCD: Construction Change Directive. On many jobs, this is a written direction to proceed with a change when the parties have not fully agreed on price or time. The work can move while the pricing is resolved under the contract. Not every project uses the term CCD. If you are given a directive to proceed, file it with the change documents, note the date, and do not treat it as a fully executed change order until the change order exists.

A change order is the agreed, executed change. Keep proposals, directives, and executed change orders clearly named so they do not look like the same thing. I walk through that habit in "Change Orders: Paper First, Then the Work." Addenda belong to the bid and contract set, and are covered in "After Bid Day: Specs, Addenda, and What Actually Governs."

The miss this prevents

This is how it tends to unfold.

The architect issues an instruction that changes a detail. Someone files it in the RFI folder, or leaves it in an inbox, because it arrived as an email with an acronym in the subject line. The field never sees it, or treats it as optional clarification. Or the reverse happens: an RFI answer that changes the work is never entered in the change log.

The real miss was filing by habit instead of by what the document does: ask a question, direct the work, or agree to a change.

Where each one belongs in the file

In the Google Drive or Dropbox job folder, give RFIs, ASIs, and change documents their own places. A practical split is RFIs in one folder, ASIs with the current set or in an instructions folder, and CCDs and change orders in the change folder.

Name each file with the date, the type, and the number: 2026-06-20_245_ASI_04_DoorClearance.pdf. If an ASI or a CCD revises a sheet, update the current set and move the old sheet to Superseded. Distribute it, and get a simple sign-off that it was received.

a basic question: was this a question, an instruction, a directive, or an executed change?

If the acronyms are already mixed

You do not have to relabel the entire history of the job. Start with anything still open that affects work this week. Put each document in the right folder, and start the naming habit on the next one.

If you want help, I can set up that job file, run document control on a retainer, or prepare closeout. Bring a recent instruction or RFI that did not have an obvious home.

The files stay yours. The file has to show what the document actually did.

If you want help, not just a checklist

Some jobs run fine on a clean file and a superintendent who gives the log fifteen minutes twice a week. Others do not: revisions are moving fast, closeout is already behind, or the field simply has no hours left for paperwork.

That is where I come in. I set up the job file, run the logs on a retainer, or prepare closeout before the scramble starts. Your files stay yours, and there is no software contract to sign.

Email travis@builtonrecord.com Get the free Job File Kit