After the work
Ask for the daily log. A firm working to a number will have one.
A drying log records moisture readings taken in the affected materials, usually twice a day, alongside the equipment running and the conditions in the room. It is how anyone knows a building is dry rather than dry to the touch.
- 00Ask for it on day oneA firm told at the start that you want the log keeps a better one.
- 01Ask what the comparison material isThe target is the local normal for that material in that building, not a fixed number.
- 02Ask for the final reading in writingThe moment equipment leaves is the moment the number stops being recorded.
- 03File it with the invoiceTogether they are the record of the event, and you will be asked for them.
Goes to an independent contractor. Nothing is booked until you say so. Calls may be recorded.
What is in it
Named spots in the structure, read twice a day and written down, with the room conditions beside them and a note of what equipment stood where. Plus one reading nobody thinks to ask for: the same material somewhere the water never reached.
The comparison point matters more than the absolute figure. Timber in a humid state reads differently from timber in a dry one, so the target is local rather than universal.
It settles the argument about equipment days
Equipment is charged per day it stands in the house, and the usual dispute is whether it needed that long. A log turns the argument into a chart: the readings either kept falling or they did not.
It works both ways. A contractor with a log can justify an unusually long dry, and an owner with a log can see when it was not necessary.
Who asks for it later
An adjuster deciding a claim, a surveyor who found a stain during a sale, a future insurer pricing the property, and a mould contractor trying to establish whether an old leak was ever dried properly. All four are answering the same question.
Why you want it
The document does different work depending on what comes next.
- 01You own and live hereAsk at the start rather than at the end, and keep it somewhere you will find it in five years.
Ask them: will you leave me the daily log as a document, not just a figure on the invoice? - 02You own and let it outIt is your evidence that the building was made dry, which is what a tenant complaint months later turns on.
- 03You are sellingA log plus a final reading answers a survey finding before it becomes a price negotiation.
- 04You are buyingWhere a repaired water event is disclosed, ask for it. A receipt proves payment; a log proves drying.
Goes to an independent contractor. Nothing is booked until you say so. Calls may be recorded.
Where these figures come from
Published by someone other than us. Each link goes to their own words rather than to our summary of them.