RFIs and submittals: confidential and personal details to review

Why are RFIs and submittals worth the review effort?#

RFIs and submittals are worth the review because they record expert judgment in a structured, dated form. An RFI states a field problem, the designer's reasoning and the answer; a submittal review shows how an engineer checked a product, a shop drawing or a calculation against the design intent and what was approved, revised or rejected.

That sequence is hard to find anywhere else, and it is what developers of tools for document review, coordination and code compliance want to learn from. The same records, though, carry client identities, site details and many people's names, so the review decides whether the value can be kept without exposing anyone.

Who controls the records before anyone reviews fields?#

The project contracts control the records, so a rights check comes before any field review. The owner agreement may assign ownership of instruments of service, grant the owner a license, or impose confidentiality on everything produced for the project; consultant and subconsultant agreements add their own terms.

Standard forms help the designer's position on some points. AIA A201-2017 Section 1.5.1 deems the architect and its consultants the authors and owners of their instruments of service, including drawings and specifications, and says contractors, subcontractors and suppliers do not own or claim copyright in them. A201 also says that submitting or distributing instruments of service to meet regulatory requirements or for other project purposes is not publication in derogation of those reserved rights.

Engineering forms can read differently. Excerpts of EJCDC E-500 grant the owner a limited license to use the documents on the project and related uses, with reuse for other purposes at the owner's risk, while some negotiated versions transfer the documents to the owner after full payment. Either way, authorship of the drawings does not settle confidentiality or the owner's interest in its own project information, so the signed agreement for each project governs.

Sort projects into three groups before any preparation: those where the firm's rights and confidentiality terms clearly allow a license of cleaned records, those that need owner consent, and those that are excluded. Only the first group moves on to the field review.

Field review list for RFIs and submittals#

The field review list below covers the content that most often needs a decision in an RFI or submittal log. Most of the fields are easy to treat; the judgment calls are building use, drawings and cost.

Relative project days deserve a word. Replacing calendar dates with days from notice to proceed keeps the timing that matters, such as how long an RFI sat in review or how many revision cycles a shop drawing needed, while removing the anchor that lets someone match the project to a public permit or news story.

Which projects should be excluded whole?#

Projects with security-sensitive content should be excluded whole, because no field-level cleaning reliably removes what makes them sensitive. That includes facilities where drawings show security systems, access control layouts, structural vulnerabilities or utility and communications infrastructure, as well as government, defense and law enforcement work.

The same applies when the owner agreement imposes strict confidentiality, when the project is subject to export controls, or when the building is so distinctive that its type and region alone identify it. A stadium, a hospital campus or the only high-rise in a small city cannot be hidden behind a project code.

Excluding a project removes its RFIs, submittals, markups and correspondence together. Partial inclusion invites someone to reassemble the project from the pieces that remain.

Where do personal details hide around each RFI?#

Personal details hide in the workflow around each RFI more than in the question itself. Construction platforms record who asked, who answered and who was copied, and every attachment carries its own author data.

PDF metadata is the detail most often missed. Files exported from Bluebeam, Revit or a scanner carry author names, company names and sometimes file paths in their document properties, so strip metadata from any file that survives the review, even when the visible page looks clean.

• 1Procore RFI ball-in-court, distribution lists and responses with names and companies.
• 2Bluebeam markups and comments that store the author's name with each annotation.
• 3Transmittals and submittal cover sheets with contact blocks.
• 4Professional stamps and seals on calculations and shop drawings.
• 5Email chains saved to the project record, with signatures and phone numbers.
• 6Meeting minutes and field reports that list attendees and site contacts.
• 7Photos from site walks showing workers, vehicles and signage.

Illustrative: a structural engineering firm reviews its RFI archive#

Illustrative: a fictional structural engineering firm keeps RFIs and submittal reviews in Procore and Bluebeam, with project files on a shared server indexed by its Deltek project numbers. The managing principal wants to license the RFI and submittal history from its commercial and multifamily work.

The rights review sorts projects by contract. Projects under the firm's standard agreement with a permissive confidentiality clause move forward; projects for one repeat developer whose agreement prohibits disclosure are held for consent; a courthouse, a utility substation and a data center are excluded on security grounds.

For the remaining projects, the team codes projects and clients, generalizes sites to region, replaces names with roles, removes stamps and seals, and shifts dates to project days. Markup images are excluded, while the text of each markup comment is kept after cleaning. The package preserves every question, response and revision cycle.

How SourceX approaches AEC project records#

SourceX handles project records through the SourceX five-step transaction: the Rights step sorts projects by contract and confidentiality terms, and the Preparation step applies the field review to what remains. The managing principal approves the project list and the field treatments before Delivery.

The SourceX Evidence Packet records which projects were excluded and why under licensing rights, and the field treatments under the privacy record, so the firm has a clear account it can show a client who later asks.