Submittals go wrong in ordinary ways. The item sits. It comes back “approved as noted,” and nobody reads the notes. The approved product data never reaches the installer. The closeout package later needs an O&M that was already in a returned submittal, and nobody can find it.

Procore’s Submittals tool is built to facilitate the process that heads off those misses: a register of what is required, a review workflow, a status you can filter, and a place to keep the official file. It is a good process, and you do not need that platform to run it. A spreadsheet log and a Google Drive or Dropbox folder reach the same goal, as long as the status is honest and the notes actually leave the office.

I saw the enterprise version of this process at Mortenson Construction, including Procore onboarding on a mission-critical data center project. The software kept a large review cycle visible, but the habit is what mattered. This article maps the process onto tools you already have.

What the process has to accomplish

A working submittal system, in any tool, has to make these things obvious:

  • What is required, and what has actually been sent
  • Where each item is in review, and who has the ball
  • The official status when it returns (approved, approved as noted, revise and resubmit, or rejected) and a place to record the notes
  • Whether the field received the approved (or noted) version
  • A path from returned product data and O&Ms into the closeout folder, so you are not hunting in month twelve

In a typical Procore project, the Submittals tool holds that register and the review workflow, and it can show status at a glance. Workflows are configured differently from job to job, so do not assume yours matches a screenshot from another project.

The simpler equivalent

Use the Submittal Log Template submittal log, kept in the job’s submittals folder. Each row is one item. Track the number, description, spec section, date sent, who has the ball, due date, date returned, official status, a short note on any “as noted” comments, whether the field received the returned file, and a link to the PDF.

Standing rules that make the sheet worth opening:

  1. “Approved as noted” is not the same as approved. Read the notes, record them, and get them to the installer. See Approved as Noted — and Nobody Read the Notes.
  2. A revise-and-resubmit is not closed. It is still open, with a new due date, until an acceptable return is in the file.
  3. When a returned submittal is also an O&M or a warranty-related cut sheet, drop a copy into the closeout folder the same day. Closeout starts at mobilization, not in the last month.
  4. Twice a week, filter to open and late items. Before a material is released or installed, confirm the approved file is the one in the field.

When this is enough

A simple log will hold if someone updates it the same week items move, and if “approved as noted” is treated as work, not as a green light. It will not hold if the log turns into a graveyard of sent dates and blank returns. “A Submittal Log a Superintendent Can Keep Up With” is the longer how-to.

If you want the log set up in your Drive or Dropbox, or kept current on a retainer, that is work I do. The files stay yours.

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