Same-Day and Urgent Lift Plans
Lift tomorrow and no plan? A LOLER compliant lift plan, written and signed off by a CPCS A61 Appointed Person with 35 years on UK sites. Most straightforward plans are issued the same working day.
Call rather than email if the lift is imminent — you will speak to the Appointed Person, not a call handler.
The honest version, because you have not got time for the other one
Most urgent lift plan enquiries come from the same place. The principal contractor has asked for a plan you did not know you needed, the lift is booked, the plant is on hire, and somebody has just realised there is no Appointed Person on the job. It is Thursday afternoon and the lift is Friday.
In the majority of those cases the answer is yes, and it is not dramatic — a single excavator or telehandler pick with a known weight and a clear area is a couple of hours of work for someone who does it every day. The plan is written, checked against the load chart, and issued ready for sign-off.
But not every lift can be planned overnight, and the useful thing a competent Appointed Person can do for you at 4pm on a Thursday is tell you which one yours is. A plan that gets produced fast and then rejected by the reviewer on Friday morning has cost you the day you were trying to save.
Usually same day
- Excavator lift plans
- Telehandler lift plans
- Lorry loader and HIAB lift plans
- Urgent lift plan checking of a submitted plan
- A written AP opinion for a principal contractor
Needs 3-5 days
- ·Tandem and multi-crane lifts
- ·Blind lifts and lifts with no direct line of sight
- ·Lifts over live highways, railways or occupied buildings
- ·Lifting near overhead power lines
- ·Mobile crane lifts needing verified ground bearing pressure
These need a site visit or engineering checks before anyone can responsibly sign them off. Call anyway — there is often a way to reduce the scope so part of the work goes ahead on time.
What to have in front of you when you call
Urgent plans stall on missing information far more often than on availability. Five minutes gathering this before you pick up the phone is usually the difference between a plan today and a plan tomorrow.
- Machine make, model and configuration
- Confirmed load weight — not an estimate
- How the load is being slung or attached
- Lift radius, or a site layout marked up
- Photographs of the lift area
- Overhead services, obstructions and boundaries
The one that matters most: a confirmed load weight. Not “about two tonne”. A plan is a calculation against a load chart, and a guessed weight cannot be signed off — it is the single most common reason an urgent job slips a day.
No Appointed Person, and a lift booked
This comes up most often on CPA crane hire. Under a CPA agreement the crane company supplies the crane and the operator — and nothing else. Planning the lifting operation and appointing a competent Appointed Person stays with you as the hirer. Under a contract lift the crane company carries that duty instead. Plenty of people find out which one they signed up to about 48 hours before the crane arrives.
An external CPCS A61 Appointed Person fills that gap. The planning duty can be picked up quickly, because it is the paperwork and the competence that the principal contractor is actually asking for. Site attendance is a separate question and depends on distance — same-day is practical within about 90 minutes of Warrington, which covers Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and the wider North West.
Your AP is off sick, has left, or their card has lapsed mid-project? Same answer, and it is worth calling before the gap becomes a stoppage.
Urgent does not mean an urgent price
Standard prices apply to same-day and next-day work in almost every case — excavator and telehandler plans from £200 + VAT, lorry loader and HIAB from £250 + VAT, mobile crane and complex lifts quoted individually. We publish our prices, which most of this market does not, and there is no surcharge for being in a hurry.
Genuine out-of-hours work — evenings, weekends, possession work — is agreed on the call before anything starts, in a figure, so there is nothing to argue about later. Full detail is in our guide to what a lift plan costs in the UK.
Urgent lift plans — common questions
Can I really get a lift plan the same day?
Often, yes — but it depends on two things: what time you call, and whether you have the information. A straightforward excavator, telehandler or lorry loader plan phoned through before about 2pm, with the machine details, load weight and a site layout to hand, can usually be issued the same working day. Call 07803 808093 rather than emailing. If it cannot be done, you will be told that on the phone in the first two minutes rather than at 6pm.
What do you need from me to turn a plan around fast?
The machine make and model, the weight of the load and how it is being slung, the lift radius or a site layout showing where the machine and the load will be, photographs of the area, and any obstructions or overhead services. Confirmed weights matter most — a guessed load weight is the single most common reason an urgent plan stalls, because it cannot be signed off against a load chart.
Which lifts can NOT be turned around same day?
Anything that genuinely needs eyes on the ground before it can be signed off: tandem and multi-crane lifts, blind lifts, lifts over live highways, railways or occupied buildings, lifts near overhead power lines, and mobile crane operations where ground bearing pressure has to be verified rather than assumed. Those need 3-5 working days and usually a site visit. Being told this honestly on the phone is more use to you than a plan that gets rejected on Monday.
Do you charge extra for urgent work?
Standard prices apply to same-day and next-day work in almost every case — excavator and telehandler plans from £200 + VAT, lorry loader from £250 + VAT. Genuine out-of-hours work, meaning evenings and weekends, is agreed on the call before anything starts. You will not receive an invoice with a surcharge you were not told about.
Do you work evenings and weekends?
Where the job needs it, yes. Construction does not stop for weekend possessions, shutdown work or overnight deliveries, and a plan that arrives on Monday is no use for a Saturday lift. Out-of-hours availability is not guaranteed in advance — it depends on what else is running — so call and ask rather than assuming either way.
Can you provide an Appointed Person at short notice?
For planning and sign-off, usually yes — an external CPCS A61 Appointed Person can pick up the planning duty quickly, which is the common situation when a principal contractor asks for an AP you do not have. Physical attendance on site at short notice depends on distance: same-day attendance is practical within about 90 minutes of Warrington, which covers Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds and the North West. Further afield it is a scheduled visit.
My lift is tomorrow morning and the principal contractor has just asked for a plan. What now?
Call 07803 808093 now rather than emailing. Most of these turn out to be straightforward single-machine lifts that can be planned and issued the same afternoon. If yours is one of the complex cases that genuinely cannot be signed off overnight, you will be told immediately, along with what you would need to do to move the lift or reduce its scope so that it can go ahead safely.
Can you check a lift plan urgently rather than write one?
Yes. Independent lift plan checking is often faster than writing from scratch, because the work is already done and it is being verified rather than created. If a subcontractor has submitted a plan and you need a competent opinion on it before tomorrow, that is usually achievable same day.
Send the details — or call 07803 808093
07803 8080933 fields, 30 seconds. We reply within 4 working hours.
Related services
Most projects need more than one of these. Here's what often pairs with this service.
Lift Plan Writing
LOLER compliant lift plans for excavators, telehandlers, mobile cranes and lorry loaders. 24-48 hour turnaround.
Learn moreCPCS A61 Appointed Person
A named CPCS A61 Appointed Person for your lifting operations — planning, lift plans and sign-off to LOLER 1998 and BS 7121.
Learn moreLift Plan Checking
Independent technical review of lift plans submitted by subcontractors. Cat A or Cat B determination with paste-ready findings.
Learn moreExcavator Lift Plans
LOLER compliant lift plans for 180° and 360° excavators. ISO 10567 capacity verification.
Learn moreLift tomorrow? Call now.
You will get a straight answer on whether it can be done today, in the first two minutes of the call.
07803 808093Or email ricky@rmtsolutions.co.uk — though the phone is faster if the lift is imminent.
Urgent lift plans across the UK
Plans are produced remotely and issued by email, so a same-day plan is same-day wherever the site is. Same-day site attendance is a different matter and is practical within about 90 minutes of Warrington. Pick your nearest city, or call 07803 808093.