Generic RAMS are two different things depending on where they are. As a template kept in the office, one per task type with the usual hazards and controls pre-filled and the site-specific parts left blank on purpose, they save an hour per job. As the document submitted to a site with those parts still blank or still describing the last site, they are the commonest reason a RAMS is returned, and the worst thing an investigator can find after an incident. The HSE's guidance, cited below, gives risk assessment as five steps: identify hazards, assess the risks, control the risks, record your findings, review the controls, and says that if you employ 5 or more people you must record your significant findings. The risk assessment and method statement tool on this site prints the RAMS from the site's own figures, free.
Generic as a template
Working at height, excavations, hot works, lifting: each with its usual hazards, controls, plant and permits pre-filled, and the location, the services, the interfaces, the emergency arrangements and the rescue plan blank. A starting point that saves the writer from a blank page.
Generic as a document
The site address changed and nothing else; the hospital from the last job; a hazard list that could belong anywhere. The site manager knows their site and returns it; after an incident the investigator reads it as evidence the task was never assessed. Regulation 3 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, cited below, requires every employer to make a suitable and sufficient assessment of the risks to the health and safety of their employees, and regulation 3(6) requires an employer with five or more employees to record the significant findings and any group of employees especially at risk.
The line between them
The walk. A template becomes a document when someone walks this site with the operative and fills the blanks from what they saw. The tool on this site asks for the site's figures each time, which is the safest template there is.
Kept
The finished RAMS in its version against the job; the template as a file. DailyLogDesk Pro keeps the finished ones; the tool prints them. From the vendors' own pricing pages, cited below: SafetyCulture lists its Premium plan at $29 per seat per month billed monthly or $24 billed annually, with a free plan for small teams; Contractor Foreman lists its Basic plan at $49 per month for one user. DailyLogDesk Pro is $29 per month for the whole site team.
Questions people ask about generic rams
Can I buy generic RAMS?
You can buy templates; the site-specific half is still yours, and it is the half that is read.
How do I know a RAMS is too generic?
If the site address could be changed and nothing else would need to, it is.
Is the tool free?
Yes, without an account.