← Back to Blog

Plan‑Linked Punch Lists and Issue Management in Constructable

Learn how Constructable ties every punch item directly to the drawings and combines in‑field AI‑assisted capture with powerful management.

•By Constructable Team

Constructable is for teams who want punch lists that actually live on the plans—not in a spreadsheet.

Why plan‑linked punch lists matter

Punch lists are supposed to be the final quality control pass before turnover. In practice, they often turn into a disconnected set of tasks:

  • A PDF markup someone emailed weeks ago
  • A spreadsheet that “sort of” matches what’s on the plans
  • Loose photos and notes that never quite make it back to the right item
  • Someone walking around with a scrap of paper and a sharpie

When punch items aren’t clearly tied to the drawings, you lose the answer to the most basic question: “Where, exactly, is this?” That slows down subs in the field, makes your team look bad to owners on walkthroughs, and makes it harder to close out cleanly.

Constructable approaches punch lists differently. Punch items are first‑class, plan‑linked issues that live inside the same drawing‑centric workflow described in our article on drawing‑centric collaboration workflows. Under the hood, every punch item is anchored to Topics and markups on the drawings. And then, on top of that, we layer AI‑assisted creation, rich field capture, and powerful table views for project managers.

Punch lists built on Topics and the drawing viewer

In Constructable, each punch list is powered by a Topic behind the scenes:

  • Every PunchListItem belongs to a PunchList
  • Each PunchList is tied to a Topic, which acts like a collaboration “layer” on the drawings
  • Markup shapes in the drawing viewer reference both the Topic and the specific PunchListItem they belong to

That means:

  • When you’re in Punch List mode in the drawing viewer, you’re not looking at a separate tool—you’re basically viewing a Topic layer that's been specialized for punch items.
  • Each punch item “knows” which sheets and markup shapes it’s associated with.
  • The system can show pins and punch‑specific markup exactly where they were created on the plans.

Because everything sits on top of the same Topics infrastructure, punch items benefit from the same drawing‑centric navigation, notifications, and search as other items in Constructable.

Creating punch items quickly in the field

Punch lists only work if they’re painless to create in the field. Constructable’s punch creation workflow is designed for supers and inspectors walking the job with a tablet or phone.

Tap on the plan, create items fast

In the drawing viewer:

  1. Switch to Punch List mode.
  2. Tap on the drawing where the issue is.
  3. Drop a pin or markup that represents the problem.
  4. The New Punch List Item dialog slides up, already linked to:
    • The correct project and punch list
    • A Topic representing this punch “layer.”
    • Any markup you add on the sheet

You’re never hunting through unrelated lists; you’re always working in context.

Dictate once, let AI help fill in the rest

At the heart of the punch item form is the Full Description. This is where you can:

  • Type a detailed description of the issue, or
  • Dictate it into the device using built‑in voice input (often much faster when walking a site).

Once you’ve captured that description, Constructable gives you an Autofill from Full Description button powered by AI:

  • The system sends your description, along with:
    • Known project Locations (with their full path names / tiers),
    • Organization Trades, and
    • A shuffled list of potential assignee companies and users,
  • To an AI prompt specifically tuned for punch items.
  • Then the AI automatically fills:
    • A concise title for the item,
    • The most likely location (by path name),
    • The most relevant trade, and
    • A reasonable assignee (often a subcontractor who has handled similar items before).

Of course, you're always in control. Just tweak or override anything as needed—but you no longer have to manually type the same information over and over. Dictate the full story once; let AI do the grunt work of filling in the structured data fields.

Attach photos and video on the spot

From the same punch item dialog, you can:

  • Take new photos of the issue using your device camera.
  • Choose from camera roll for images or clips you just captured.
  • See all media in a preview grid, tied directly to the punch item’s discussion.

These photos and videos:

  • Travel with the item wherever it's viewed (drawing viewer, punch list page, PDFs).
  • Make it much easier for subs and managers to understand the problem without walking back to the exact spot.

Combined with the plan‑linked pin, this gives you a quick, complete, field‑friendly capture flow: tap, dictate, autofill, snap photos, save.

Managing punches with a powerful table view

While field users live in the viewer and item sheets, managers often need a big‑picture view: How many items are open? Where are they? Who owns what? What’s at risk of going past due?

Constructable helps managers answer these questions with a data‑grid‑style punch list index view.

Slice and dice tasks by status, assignee, trade, location tiers, and due dates

The punch list management view is shown in a powerful, sophisticated datagrid table. For each item, managers can see:

  • Title (clickable to drill into the full punch item details),
  • Status (Open, In Review, Completed, Rejected),
  • Trade,
  • Location tier (tier 1, 2, 3, etc.):
  • Due Date,
  • Assignee
  • Description
  • Activity / notifications (recent changes, unseen updates).

On top of that, managers can group and filter by:

  • Trade (e.g. all electrical vs. all framing),
  • Due Date (grouped by date buckets),
  • Assignee (by person or company),
  • Status (at a glance view of open vs. completed),
  • Location hierarchy:
    • Tier 1: Building / Area
    • Tier 1 > 2: Building → Level
    • Tier 1 > 2 > 3 (and so on).

Grouping by status even shows completion percentages in group headers (using circular progress indicators), which makes it easy to answer questions like “How close is the fourth floor to punch‑complete?” in seconds.

Inline status control with permitted transitions

Each row shows the item’s current status using a Status badge. When permitted by your role:

  • Clicking the badge opens a set of allowed transitions (e.g. Open → In Review, In Review → Completed).
  • These transitions are constrained to what makes sense (no jumping directly from Deleted back to Open), so the workflow stays clean.
  • A single click updates the status, records an event, and refreshes notification badges.

This makes punch review meetings much faster—you can walk through the list on a big screen and update statuses as the group agrees, without jumping in and out of individual item dialogs.

Bulk actions to keep everything moving

Sometimes you just need to make changes for many items at once—for example:

  • Extending due dates after a weather delay,
  • Reassigning a large group of items to a different sub,
  • Updating approvers or trades after re‑scoping work.

From the desktop punch list view, once you’ve filtered and/or selected items, you can:

  • Open bulk dialogs to edit:
    • Due dates,
    • Assignees,
    • Approvers,
    • Statuses,
    • Trades,
  • Choose whether to apply changes to:
    • All items in the current filter, or
    • Only the selected set.

Bulk editing makes it realistic to keep punch data accurate and up to date, even on large projects with hundreds or thousands of items.

Punch‑specific markup on the plans

Because punch lists are part of the drawing viewer’s markup modes, Constructable supports punch‑specific markup tools:

  • When you’re in Punch List mode, you can use pins, clouds, and shapes that are explicitly tied to punch items.
  • Each markup shape carries a punchListItemId, so the system knows:
    • Which punch the markup belongs to,
    • Which sheet and revision it sits on,
    • How to navigate back to that exact view later.
  • The Sheet Pins panel in the punch item’s detail view shows each sheet where that item has markup, with quick navigation links to jump to other drawing sheets.

This gives you a clear visual story:

  • On the punch list index, you see the structured data.
  • On the item detail view, you see photos, comments, location, and related items.
  • In the drawing viewer, you see the actual pins and markups exactly where the issue exists.

All three views stay in sync, because they’re just different lenses on the same underlying Topic and markup data.

Comments, dependencies, and media per punch item

Every punch item in Constructable can carry:

  • A rich description, potentially AI‑assisted from your full text or dictation,
  • Photos and video (including from the field photo upload pipeline),
  • Comment threads for back‑and‑forth with subs and internal team members,
  • Dependencies:
    • Parent/child relationships (e.g. small follow‑up items dependent on a main issue),
    • A clear “Dependent On” field in the Overview and a Dependents block listing child items.

Because punch items use the same Discussion and CommentThread models as other parts of the app, they also benefit from:

  • Mentioning teammates in comments,
  • Per‑item notification settings,
  • Event history that tracks status changes and edits.

In other words, each punch item is a proper issue record, not just a row in a spreadsheet.

Plan‑linked issues that work for both field and office

Putting it all together, Constructable’s plan‑linked punch lists tool gives you:

  • For field teams:
    • Tap‑to‑create punch items directly on the drawings.
    • Dictate a full description once, then use AI autofill to populate title, location, trade, and assignee.
    • Attach photos and video in the moment, without leaving the viewer.
  • For managers and coordinators:
    • A powerful, filterable table view with grouping by trade, location tiers, due dates, assignees, and status.
    • Inline status updates with permitted transitions.
    • Bulk actions for due dates, assignees, approvers, trades, and statuses.
    • Clean exports and reports that carry punch item data and media forward.

And under the hood, everything stays anchored to the drawings through Topics—so any time you need to understand “what” and “where,” you can jump right back to the plan and see the punch item in its exact context.

If you’d like to see how plan‑linked punch lists feel in practice, reach out for a demo—we’d be happy to walk through your current punch process and show how Constructable can help you close out projects more confidently.