Digital forms & docs for event business: Site Survey

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Digital forms & docs for event business: Site Survey

Most event businesses are still running on paper forms, email attachments, and Word documents cobbled together years ago. They work, until they don't — the site survey gets left in the van, the handover form doesn't get signed, the damage report never makes it back to the office, and six weeks later someone is trying to reconstruct what happened from memory.

GoodEvent Docs is a digital form builder built specifically for the events industry. It replaces every clipboard, every PDF attachment, and every form that doesn't reliably get completed — with digital forms that anyone can fill in on their phone, with no login required, that submit directly to a searchable dashboard.
The starting point is 50+ pre-built event forms, ready to clone and customise today.

50+ Pre-Built Event Forms — Clone and Customise

Building a form from scratch is possible in GoodEvent Docs, but most event businesses don't need to. The form library already contains over 50 templates covering the most common documents in the industry — built for event businesses, not repurposed from generic form tools.
The library includes forms from industry organisations including MUTA (the Marquee and Structures Trade Association) and ROA, meaning many of the compliance and safety templates already reflect industry best practice. You find the form you need, clone it, and customise it for your business — logo, contact information, specific fields for your event type. You're starting from 80% done, not from a blank page.

What's in the library

The pre-built templates cover the full range of event business documentation:

  • Site surveys — ground type, access, power availability, surface conditions
  • Pre-erection site checks — weather, overhead cables, emergency access, H&S sign-off
  • Site handover records — condition at departure, photos, client signature
  • Damage and returns forms — item condition, photos, crew sign-off
  • Client information and intake forms — event details, guest counts, requirements
  • Terms and conditions acknowledgement — with digital signature
  • Delivery confirmation — received by, condition, any issues noted
  • Staff and crew sign-in forms — shift confirmation, H&S briefing acknowledgement
  • Venue access forms — vehicle details, delivery windows, site contact
  • Risk assessments — pre-event safety documentation

Whether you're a marquee hire company, furniture rental business, AV supplier, catering company, event planner, generator provider, or any other kind of event business — there's a starting template for the form you actually need.

How the Site Survey Works — A Walkthrough

The site survey is one of the most universally used forms in the events industry. Almost every outdoor event requires one before a supplier commits to a quote — you need to know the ground type, whether there's power on site, what the access is like, and what the client actually needs.
In GoodEvent Docs, the furniture rental site survey template comes pre-loaded with the standard fields: what items the client requires, whether there's power on site, what type of surface it is, access details, and any site-specific considerations. You can remove fields you don't need, mark others as required (so the form can't be submitted without them), and add new ones from a library of over 16 field types.

Field types available

The field builder includes: text answers (short and long), number fields, phone number, date and time pickers, yes/no questions, multiple choice, dropdown menus, star ratings, file uploads, photo capture, signature fields, and more. Any combination of these can go into any form.
The required field setting is particularly important for site surveys — if you need the site address and client name before you'll proceed, mark those as required and the form won't submit without them. No more submissions that are missing the one piece of information you actually needed.
Once your form is built, you can start using it within the business straight away. All you need to do is click share, copy the link, and send it — the recipient does not need login details and does not need to create an account with GoodEvent.

Sharing Forms — No Login, No App, No Friction

This is the part that makes GoodEvent Docs work in the real world of events. When you share a form link — with a client, a crew member, a venue contact, a subcontractor — the person receiving it does not need to create an account. They open the link on their phone and the form is there, ready to fill in.
That removes the single biggest reason paper forms still exist in the industry: digital forms have historically required someone to create an account, download an app, or navigate a system they've never used. GoodEvent Docs skips all of that. The link opens to a clean, mobile-optimised form. The person fills it in and submits. Done.
You can share forms by email, by copying and pasting the link into a WhatsApp message, by including the link in a booking confirmation, or by embedding it in your website. However you currently communicate with clients and crew, the form link goes in the same channel.

Where Submissions Go

Every submission appears in your GoodEvent Docs dashboard instantly — timestamped, with all fields completed, and searchable. If a client submits a site survey on a Tuesday, you can pull it up on Wednesday with the address, the ground type, the power situation, and whatever else they filled in, all in one place.
Submissions don't disappear into an inbox or get attached to an email thread you'll need to find later. They live in the dashboard, organised by form type, retrievable any time.

Photo and file uploads

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Any form can include a photo upload field. For a site survey, this means the client can photograph the access point, the ground surface, any overhead obstacles, or the exact area where equipment needs to go. Those photos are attached to the submission permanently — when you're planning the job, the site photos are already there.
For handover and damage forms, photo uploads become the evidence chain. Timestamped photos of equipment condition at departure and return are what resolves disputes. Building photo upload as a required field on those forms means the evidence always exists.

Connecting Docs to GoodEvent Business

If you use GoodEvent Business for quotes, stock management, and booking management, GoodEvent Docs connects directly. Forms can be linked to specific bookings — the client's site survey submission sits against their booking record, accessible alongside their quote, their floor plan, and their delivery note.
This means a crew member checking a delivery note on their phone can also access the site survey the client completed three weeks earlier, without anyone having to forward it. The information flows with the booking rather than existing separately in a dashboard nobody checks before heading to site.
Site survey data can also feed into load lists and delivery notes — ground type affects what equipment you send, power availability affects the generator, access details affect the vehicle choice. When that information is attached to the booking, it reaches the right people at the right time.

Every Type of Event Business, Every Type of Form

GoodEvent Docs isn't built for one segment of the events industry. The form library and the builder itself cover the documentation needs of any business involved in events:

Hire companies — marquee, furniture, AV, flooring, staging, generators

Site surveys before quoting, pre-erection checks before installation, handover records at the end of the job, damage forms when equipment returns. The four forms that cover most of the paperwork disputes hire companies face.

Event planners and coordinators

Client information and intake forms, supplier briefing documents, venue access coordination, dietary and access requirement collection. Everything that currently lives in an email chain, in one place.

Catering and hospitality

Dietary requirement forms, allergen declarations, service confirmation at handover, end-of-service condition records for hired catering equipment.
Production and technical teams
Risk assessments, crew H&S briefing acknowledgements, equipment sign-out and sign-in records, pre-show technical checks.

Venues and event spaces

Supplier access forms, load-in schedules, post-event condition surveys, booking information collection.

Whether you're running a single-person hire operation or managing a team across multiple simultaneous events, the documentation requirements are the same: collect the right information before the job, record what happened during it, and have something to refer to if anything is disputed afterwards.

Why Paper Still Fails (and Why the Fix Is Simpler Than You Think)

Paper forms fail in three predictable ways. They don't get completed when time is short or the conditions are bad — a clipboard in a muddy field at 6am is the wrong format. They get lost before anyone can act on the information — the site survey that ends up behind the passenger seat of the lorry. And they're impossible to search — finding the handover form from a job three months ago takes 20 minutes if it exists at all.

Digital forms that take two minutes to complete on a phone, that require no login from the recipient, and that submit directly to a searchable dashboard fix all three problems. The right information reaches the right people in a format they can actually use.

The transition doesn't have to happen all at once. Clone the site survey template. Test it on the next job. When it works, add the pre-erection check. Then the handover form. Within a month, the three forms that matter most are embedded in the process — and the paperwork disputes start to look different.

Getting Started

GoodEvent Docs is free to use. The Lite plan includes unlimited forms, real-time sync, and e-signatures — with a GoodEvent watermark on forms. The Pro plan at £10 per month removes the watermark and adds custom branding. If you're already on GoodEvent Business, you get 50% off Docs Pro.

Browse the form library and start with the site survey — or whichever form causes the most friction in your current process — at goodevent.com/products/docs. Clone it, customise it, and send your first link today.
For outdoor site planning that connects with your site survey data, see GoodEvent Maps. For connecting form submissions directly to bookings, quotes, and delivery notes, GoodEvent Business integrates with GoodEvent Docs directly.