Documentation by level
Company, worker and equipment, with different requirements depending on the type of work.
CAE
No paperwork in order, no access to the site
Contractor coordination with company, worker and equipment documentation validated before access, and expiry dates watched by the platform.
What the rule actually requires
Coordination of business activities is the duty, set out in art. 24 of Spanish Law 31/1995 and developed by Royal Decree 171/2004, for companies sharing a workplace to exchange information about their risks and coordinate their preventive measures. Kimobox turns that duty into a circuit with states: the contractor uploads documentation for the company, for each worker and for each machine, someone validates it, and access is only enabled when everything is in order and current.
- Governing rule
- Royal Decree 171/2004 Implements art. 24 of Law 31/1995 on the prevention of occupational risks
- Site occupier
- Informs about the site risks Art. 7 RD 171/2004: in writing where risks are serious or very serious
- Principal employer
- Monitors the contractor Art. 10: duty of vigilance where its own core activity is contracted out
- Construction
- Maximum 3 levels of subcontracting Art. 5 of Law 32/2006, with the exceptions the rule itself provides
- Subcontracting book
- Mandatory on site Art. 8 of Law 32/2006 and RD 1109/2007
Expiry dates watched for you
Alerts sent to the supplier before the deadline, not after the incident.
Access authorization
No entry permit is issued without valid documentation.
Article 24 evidence
Full record of the information exchanged between companies.
Cascading subcontractors
Your contractors' own subcontractors, onboarded under the main contractor without losing traceability.
Continuous evaluation
Incidents, deadlines and quality of work delivered turned into an objective score and ranking.
Special-risk work
Additional permits for hot work, work at height or in confined spaces.
Physical access control
The list of authorized workers is sent to the turnstile, kiosk or the site's access control system.
What it controls
Before, during and after the work
- Onboarding contractors and cascading subcontractors
- Requirements configurable by activity type and risk
- Manual or automatic validation by document type
- Access control with a list of authorized workers
- Special work permits and hot-work permits
- Coordination report for audits and inspections
- Supplier evaluation with an objective ranking by incidents, deadlines and quality
- Automatic notification to the supplier when a document is about to expire
- Full access history by worker, site and date
- Unified panel with the supplier portal and purchasing
How it works
From the information exchange to the access authorization
Before an external worker sets foot on site, the site owner and the contractor exchange their risk information. Company, worker and equipment documentation is validated separately, and only then is the access authorization issued.
- Risk information exchanged between the site owner and the contractor
- Company, worker and equipment documentation validated separately
- Access authorization issued only when everything is in order
Continuous evaluation
Coordination doesn't end at the gate
Every safety incident, every documentary deadline met or missed, and every quality indicator turns into an objective score used to decide which suppliers you keep working with.
- Incident, deadline and quality indicators combined into one score
- A ranking comparable across contractors doing the same type of work
- Evaluation history available to purchasing and quality
Regulatory framework
The reference authority in occupational safety
Real examples
Situations that end in an inspection notice
Industrial plant · shutdown
Eight contractors at once for two weeks
Before A shared folder per contractor, manual review of each, and a maintenance manager doing full-time admin work.
After Each contractor uploads its own with the requirement list visible. Validation becomes a review rather than a collection exercise, and the status of all eight fits on one screen.
Shopping centre
A new worker from a regular contractor
Before The company is approved, so they are waved through. Nobody has checked whether that particular person has current training and fitness.
After Approval is per company, per worker and per equipment. A worker without their documentation gets no badge, even if their employer is approved.
Building site
An uncontrolled subcontracting chain
Before A third-tier subcontractor turns up on site without the main contractor knowing. The subcontracting book gets filled in afterwards.
After Each tier is declared in the platform and the system warns when the legal limit is reached. The book reflects what actually happened.
Vocabulary
The roles under RD 171/2004
- Site occupier
- Whoever has the capacity to make available and manage the workplace. They must inform the other companies of the site's own risks and of the emergency arrangements.
- Principal employer
- Whoever contracts works or services forming part of their own core activity and carries them out at their site. Beyond informing, they have a duty of vigilance over the contractor.
- Preventive resource
- A designated person with sufficient training whose presence is mandatory in certain high-risk situations. Their presence must be evidenced, not merely planned.
- Means of coordination
- The instruments listed in art. 11 of RD 171/2004: information exchange, meetings, instructions, presence of preventive resources, among others. The company chooses, but must keep a record.
- Concurrence
- The situation where workers from two or more companies coincide in one workplace. It is the fact that triggers the duty to coordinate, whether or not there is a contract between them.
Frequently asked questions
What people ask us before getting started
Can it replace our current CAE platform?
Yes, and it also ends up unified with quality, purchasing and the supplier portal.
Who uploads the documents?
The supplier itself, from their portal, always seeing a visible list of what's missing.
Does it integrate with access control?
Yes, the list of authorized workers can be sent to the turnstile or access system.
What if a supplier has its own subcontractors?
They're onboarded in cascade under the main contractor, without losing traceability of who's responsible for each document.
How are special-risk jobs handled?
With additional work permits for hot work, work at height or in confined spaces, linked to the worker's access authorization.
Can I look up a worker's access history?
Yes, every access is logged with date, time and the state of their documentation at that moment.
How does the supplier ranking work?
It combines safety incidents, compliance with documentary deadlines and quality of work delivered into a score comparable across contractors doing the same type of work.
Which rule actually requires coordination?
Art. 24 of Spanish Law 31/1995 on the prevention of occupational risks, developed by Royal Decree 171/2004. The duty arises from workers of several companies simply coinciding in one workplace, whether or not there is a contract between them.
What is the difference between site occupier and principal employer?
The occupier manages the site and must inform about its risks and emergency arrangements. The principal employer contracts works or services forming part of its own core activity and, beyond informing, has a duty of vigilance over the contractor.
How many subcontracting levels does Spanish construction law allow?
Three as a general rule, under art. 5 of Law 32/2006, with the specific exceptions the rule itself provides. The platform warns when the limit is reached rather than letting you discover it while filling in the book.
What is a preventive resource and how is it evidenced?
A designated person with sufficient training whose presence is mandatory in high-risk situations. What gets audited is not that they were planned but that they were there, so their presence must be recorded.
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Sources
Where each figure comes from
References to the official text in force. If a standard is revised, this page is updated and the review date says so.
- Royal Decree 171/2004 implementing art. 24 of Law 31/1995 on coordination of business activities BOE-A-2004-1848 · 31 January 2004
- Law 32/2006 regulating subcontracting in the construction sector BOE-A-2006-18205 · 19 October 2006
- Royal Decree 1109/2007 implementing Law 32/2006 (Subcontracting Book and REA) BOE-A-2007-15766 · 25 August 2007
- Technical guide on risks arising from business concurrence INSST · Current technical guide
Contractor coordination (CAE) software
Kimobox's CAE module manages contractor coordination as required by Article 24 of Spain's Occupational Risk Prevention Act: company, worker and equipment documentation, validation by document type, and automatic expiry control.
The platform only issues site access authorizations when documentation is up to date, manages contractors and cascading subcontractors, and keeps evidence of the information exchange for audits and inspections.
Coordination doesn't end at the gate: every safety incident, every deadline met and every quality indicator turns into a continuous evaluation with a supplier ranking, useful for deciding who you keep working with and for justifying purchasing decisions.
Special work permits for specific-risk tasks — hot work, work at height or in confined spaces — stay linked to the worker's access authorization, and the full access history is available by worker, site and date for any audit or inspection.