Construction Site Gatemen

The gate is where a construction site either controls who comes in or does not. Everything downstream of it — the accuracy of the fire roll call, whether inductions have actually been completed, whether a delivery arrives into a slot or into the middle of a lift — depends on someone competent standing at that point and keeping a record.

Andor Group supplies SIA-licensed gatemen to construction sites across the south of England and nationwide. They control access points, verify personnel and vehicles, book deliveries in against the programme and maintain an accurate site register, logged in real time through HitDesk, our workforce management platform, so the record is timestamped and available to you rather than sitting in a book in the cabin.

What a gateman actually does on your site

Controls who gets past the gate, and proves it

Every person entering is checked against the induction record before they get on site, not afterwards. Subcontractors, visitors and delivery drivers are signed in and out, so at any point in the day there is a live, accurate count of who is on site and where they should be. In an evacuation that record is the roll call, and its accuracy is the difference between a controlled headcount and a search for someone who left at lunchtime.

Manages deliveries against the programme

Uncontrolled deliveries are one of the most common causes of both congestion and loss. A gateman books vehicles in against the schedule, holds them where there is no slot, directs them to the right offloading point and signs materials in on arrival. That last step matters more than it sounds: material that is never formally received is material nobody notices missing until it is needed.

Protects the perimeter at its weakest point

A site’s hoarding is only as good as its gate, and the gate is open for most of the working day. A permanent presence there closes the most predictable route in. It also means the perimeter is being looked at continuously rather than checked on a patrol round, so a gap opened by a delivery vehicle at ten in the morning is spotted at ten, not at ten at night.

Keeps vehicles and people apart at the entrance

The site entrance is where reversing vehicles, pedestrians and often a public footway meet. Gatemen manage that interface directly, holding pedestrians while a vehicle manoeuvres and stopping the unplanned reverse. On sites with heavier vehicle movements this works alongside dedicated traffic marshals and a wider traffic management plan rather than replacing them.

Where a gateman is the right answer, and where it is not

A gateman is the right call when a site has significant daily footfall, multiple subcontractors, regular deliveries, or a client who needs auditable access records. It is the cheapest way to fix an access problem, because it removes the cause rather than recording the consequence.

It is not the right answer on its own for out-of-hours risk. A gateman covers the working day; a site that is also being targeted overnight needs static security officers, mobile patrols or monitored CCTV alongside. We would rather tell you that at the quotation stage than supply a day shift and leave the actual exposure uncovered.

Licensing, accreditation and reporting

Every officer supplied holds a valid Security Industry Authority licence for the role they are performing, and that is verifiable. Andor Group holds ISO 9001, ISO 14001 and ISO 45001, certified for security guarding services, together with SafeContractor accreditation and SSIP approval under the Deem to Satisfy process, and is a Constructionline Gold member, having also completed Constructionline’s Social Value assessment. We work to BS 7499 for static site guarding and mobile patrol services, BS 10800 for the provision of security services, BS 7984 for keyholding and response services, and BS 7858 for security screening, with BPSS clearance where a contract requires it. Employer’s liability, public liability and professional indemnity insurance are each held at £10 million. Certificate numbers, scopes and expiry dates for every accreditation are set out on our accreditations page, and copies are available on request.

Access logs, visitor records, delivery bookings and incident reports are captured digitally and available to you directly. When a principal contractor audits the site, or an insurer asks who was on site on a particular night, the answer exists in one place and cannot be reconstructed after the fact.

What we need to mobilise

The more we know before the first shift, the more the cover is shaped around your site rather than around a generic assignment. Useful to have ready: site hours and the programme, the induction process and who runs it, the delivery schedule and booking system, the site layout with entry points marked, who has authority to approve access, and the escalation route out of hours.

From that we write assignment instructions specific to your site, covering what the gateman checks, what they log, what they do about an unbooked delivery, and who they call when something is wrong. Generic instructions are the most common reason gate cover underperforms.

Common questions

Are your gatemen SIA licensed?

Yes. Every gateman we supply holds a valid SIA licence for the role, and we can provide licence details for verification before mobilisation.

What hours can you cover?

Whatever the site needs. Most gate cover runs with site hours, typically an early start before first deliveries through to close, but we also cover extended hours, weekends and shutdown periods where the programme requires it.

How quickly can you mobilise?

For most sites in our coverage area we can mobilise within a few days, and faster where there is an urgent gap. What speeds it up most is having the site layout, programme and induction process ready so assignment instructions can be written for your site rather than adapted from a template.

Do we need a gateman as well as security guards?

Often, yes, because they solve different problems. A gateman controls access during the working day; static officers, patrols or monitored CCTV cover the site when it is empty. On smaller sites one officer may reasonably do both, and we will say so.

What welfare does a gateman need?

Somewhere warm and dry to work from, with access to a toilet and the means to make a hot drink. This is frequently left out of a security specification and it directly affects the quality of the cover. Where the site has no suitable provision we can supply site cabins and welfare units alongside the officer.

What records do we get?

A timestamped log of everyone who entered and left, deliveries booked and received, visitors recorded, and any incidents reported. These are available to you directly through HitDesk rather than being written up after the event.

Discuss cover for your site

If you have a site coming up, or gate cover that is not working, we would rather look at your programme and layout than quote blind from a schedule of rates. See the full range of construction site security services, or get in touch on 020 4602 3974 or at sales@andorgroup.com.