R-09White paperResource Center
Spreadsheet, service or software: a vendor-neutral way to choose how to manage contractor COIs
There are three ways to run a certificate program. Each one works for some companies and fails others. This paper sets out what each does well, where each breaks, and how to score them for your own company.
By The editors, COI Journal ·
The questionIs it better to manage contractor COIs in a spreadsheet, outsource COI tracking, or use software?
Key findings
- A spreadsheet tracks dates well and requirements badly. It works for a handful of trades on a handful of jobs.
- An outsourced service adds people who chase paperwork. Check what it actually reviews: certificates only, or endorsements against your requirements.
- Software scales tracking and reminders. The question that separates products is whether they read endorsements against each project's requirements or just store certificates.
- Whichever model you pick, the cost that matters most is the gap you miss, not the hours you spend.
The three models
Spreadsheet. Someone on staff keeps a sheet of trades, policies, limits and expiration dates, and files certificates in a shared drive. Reminders are calendar entries or memory.
Outsourced service. A third party collects certificates from your trades, chases missing ones and reports status back. Some services also review against your requirements.
Software. A system stores certificates and requirements, sends renewal requests and flags problems. Some products read the documents and compare them with each project's requirements automatically. Others mainly store and remind.
Many companies end up with a mix: software plus a person, or a service that uses software.
What each does well, and where it breaks
Spreadsheets are free, familiar and flexible. They break on three things: requirements that differ by project, endorsements that need reading rather than logging, and staff turnover. A spreadsheet only knows what someone typed into it.
Services add capacity. The question to ask is what "review" means. Collecting and logging a certificate is different from reading each endorsement against each project's requirements and telling you what fails. Ask for a sample deficiency report.
Software adds scale and reminders. The products differ most on depth: whether they check the endorsements themselves, handle different requirements per project, explain why something fails, and keep an audit trail you could show an owner or a carrier.
A scoring method
Score each option from 0 to 3 on each line, weighted for your company.
- Requirements per project. Can it hold different requirements per project and per trade?
- Endorsement review. Does it read the endorsements, or only the certificate? See additional insured.
- Renewals. Does it chase renewals before policies expire, and flag lapses? See notice of cancellation.
- Explanations. When something fails, does it say what, why and what to ask for?
- Broker loop. Can the trade's broker receive the deficiency and send the fix without an email chain?
- Audit trail. Can you show who checked what, when?
- Fit. Does it work with the tools you already run projects in?
- Cost. Total cost per year, including your own staff time.
On cost
Published cost estimates for manual tracking are scarce and mostly come from vendors. One, from BCS, puts it at $36,400 a year, based on 20 hours a week at $35 an hour. That is a self-reported estimate from a company that sells tracking software, and it measures only labor.
The bigger cost doesn't appear in any time sheet: the claim that lands on your policy because a gap went unnoticed. When you compare models, weigh how likely each is to catch the gaps that matter, not only the hours it saves. Our white paper A certificate is not coverage lists the gaps to test for.
A simple rule of thumb
- A few trades on a few jobs with uniform requirements: a disciplined spreadsheet can work, if someone reads the endorsements.
- Many trades, many jobs, different requirements per project: you need either a service that reviews endorsements or software that does, plus someone who owns the exceptions.
See also our specification for any COI tool.
How we wrote this
This is a vendor-neutral, qualitative paper. COI Journal does not rank or review vendors, including our publisher. The only cost figure cited is a self-reported vendor estimate, labeled as such. General information, not legal or insurance advice.
Sources
- The $36,000 Problem: What Manual COI Tracking Is Really Costing You, BCS, May 14, 2026
General information, not legal or insurance advice. Read your contracts and policies with your broker or attorney. COI Journal is published by Forsured, which sells construction insurance compliance software. How we keep editorial separate.
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