How to Fill Out the Army QA/QC Form (ENG Form 2538-2)

To fill out ENG Form 2538-2, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Quality Assurance Report (QAR) Daily Log of Construction, a government QA Representative completes 28 numbered blocks each day of construction activity: project identifiers, weather and site conditions, personnel counts, a narrative of work performed, inspection and test results, verbal instructions, controversial matters, safety issues, and signatures. The current civil-works version is dated June 2024 and is governed by Engineer Regulation 1180-1-6.¹ The blank PDF is a free download from the USACE Publications site under Engineer Forms.²

Who Prepares the Report and When

The QAR is a government document. The Quality Assurance Representative assigned to the project prepares a report for each day they visit the site. If a QAR did not visit on a given construction day, ER 1180-1-6 requires the next report to state the reason for the absence and any pertinent observations about what happened during that gap.³ On multi-shift jobs, each QA Representative writes and signs their own report for the shift they cover.⁴

The contractor prepares its own daily Quality Control Report (QCR). A printed note on ENG Form 2538-2 states that if the QCR already covers a piece of information, the QAR does not need to repeat it.¹ File the QCR alongside the QAR as a companion record.

Header Identifiers: Blocks 1 Through 6

The first six blocks identify the project. They rarely change day to day, but the QAR becomes part of the permanent contract record, so get them right the first time.

Block 1, Date: the calendar date of the construction activity being reported.
Block 2, Report Number: a sequential number starting at 1 on the first day.
Block 3, To: the office receiving the report, usually the Resident Engineer or Area Engineer.
Block 4, Contract Number: the USACE contract number.
Block 5, Contractor: the prime contractor’s name, or “hired labor” if government forces are performing the work.
Block 6, Project: the project name and location.

Weather and Site Conditions: Blocks 7 to 9, 11, and 13

Weather data drives time-extension requests and claims, and ER 1180-1-6 lists weather as the first item every QAR must cover.³

Block 7, Weather: a short description (clear, overcast, rain, and so on).
Block 8, Portion of Day Suitable for Operations: a percentage for each of five categories — structural excavation, borrow excavation, embankment, concrete, and structure work. A steady rain might leave embankment at 0% while structure work under cover stays at 80%. The RMS manual explains this value as the percentage of the shift suitable for each operation.⁵
Block 9, Temperature: minimum and maximum temperature in degrees Fahrenheit for the shift worked.
Block 11, 24-Hour Precipitation: total rainfall in inches and the period it covers.
Block 13, River Stage: water level in feet and the time of the reading, used on civil works projects near waterways.

Personnel, Shifts, and Equipment: Blocks 12, 14, and 15

Workforce counts show whether the contractor is staffing to meet the schedule and become evidence in any later dispute about the pace of work.

Block 12, Government Employees: break the count into supervisory, office, layout, inspection, and labor, then total.
Block 14, Contractor’s Employees: record supervisory, skilled, and laborer personnel with a total, and attach a separate list showing the number and classification of all contractor personnel on site that day.¹
Block 15, Number of Shifts: one, two, or three, with start and end times for each.

Also attach a list of major equipment items, both idle and working. Idle equipment can point to supply problems, breakdowns, or underutilization that may later explain schedule slippage.

Work Performed and Progress: Blocks 10 and 16 Through 19

Here the form shifts from checkboxes and numbers to narrative. Write in enough detail that a reader coming to the log months later can reconstruct the day.

Block 10, Change Order or Finding of Fact: a yes-or-no on whether anything developed that could lead to a change order or changed-conditions finding. Check yes for unexpected soil conditions, design conflicts, or anything else that might generate a modification. ER 1180-1-6 requires the QAR to flag matters that could result in a claim.³
Block 16, Contractor Areas of Responsibility: list each contractor and subcontractor with a letter designation (a through g) and describe the area of work each handled.
Block 17, Work Performed Today: describe the location and type of work, referring back to the letters from Block 16 so it is clear who did what.
Block 18, Days of No Work: if no work occurred, explain why — weather, material shortage, holiday, labor dispute, or another cause.
Block 19, Progress, Delays, and Causes: summarize overall pace, identify delays, state their cause, and estimate their duration. Include notes on plant condition and material deliveries.

EP 415-1-261 calls the daily log the most valid documentary record of construction progress and critical evidence if a claim is later filed by or against the government.⁴

Quality Control and Inspections: Blocks 20 and 21

These blocks record government oversight of the contractor’s quality control program.

Block 20, CQC Control Phases Attended: USACE uses a three-phase inspection system — preparatory, initial, and follow-up — for each definable feature of work. Record which phases you attended and the instructions you gave during each.⁶
Block 21, QA Inspection and Test Results: document results of any government inspections or tests, note deficiencies, describe the action taken, and record the contractor’s corrective response. ER 1180-1-6 requires government QA tests at a frequency of at least 5 percent of the contractor’s own quality control tests. Add comments on the overall effectiveness of the contractor’s CQC activities.³

When recording deficiencies, be specific about location, the specification section violated, and what the contractor did or agreed to do. Vague entries do not hold up if the record is later needed for a dispute.

Instructions, Controversies, and Safety: Blocks 22 Through 25

These blocks capture communication, disputes, and hazard tracking. They generate the most contentious records, so more detail is better than less.

Block 22, Verbal Instructions to Contractor: record the name and title of the contractor representative who received the instruction, what you told them, and their reaction. This creates a paper trail for directives that might otherwise turn into he-said-she-said disputes.
Block 23, Controversial Matters: detail anything that could develop into a claim or disagreement. ER 1180-1-6 requires “complete details of any matter that may possibly result in a claim.”³
Block 24, Items Not Covered on QCR: capture information, instructions, or actions the contractor’s QCR did not address, plus any disagreements between government QA and contractor QC staff.
Block 25, Safety: document infractions of the approved safety plan, the safety manual, or instructions from government personnel, and note the corrective action. Record near-miss incidents as well; frequency data provides an important historical record.⁴

Remarks and Signatures: Blocks 26 Through 28

Block 26 is a catch-all. ER 1180-1-6 specifically requires the QAR to note site visitors, so record their names and titles here along with any other observations relevant to the work.³

Block 27 takes the QA Representative’s printed name, title, date, and signature. Block 28 is the same for the supervisor. Sign both the same day or as close to it as possible. In RMS, electronic signatures are available through the system without requiring a Common Access Card.⁷

Paper Form or RMS

ER 1180-1-6 states that all construction contracts will be administered, managed, and documented using the USACE construction management system of record, currently the Resident Management System (RMS).³ Most QARs enter their daily data directly into RMS. The fields are the same as the paper form, but RMS adds drop-down menus for deficiency tracking, automated linkage between QA and QC reports, and pass/fail status tracking for individual tests.⁵ Manually signed paper reports are still accepted.⁷

A daily report in RMS is required for every calendar day of the contract, from the Notice to Proceed or the start of on-site construction through the Contract Completion Date or Substantial Completion Date, including weekends, holidays, and non-workdays within that span. If work continues after substantial completion, daily reports continue for every day work occurs on site.⁷

Practices That Keep the Log Defensible

The QAR is a legal document. If a contractor files a claim three years from now arguing that government delays added cost, both sides will comb through these logs for evidence. A few habits separate a record that holds up from one that does not.

Stick to facts. EP 415-1-261 directs that the daily report “should be kept in a formal manner, including only factual information.”⁴ Opinions about a contractor’s competence and speculation about future problems do not belong. Write what you saw, measured, or were told, and attribute statements to the person who made them by name and title.

Record delays with specificity. “Rain delay” is not enough. State the time work stopped, the time it resumed, how many workers and pieces of equipment were idled, what caused the stoppage, and how it was resolved. The same level of detail applies to material shortages, equipment breakdowns, and labor disputes.

Flag potential claims early. Any time site conditions differ from what the plans and specifications show, whether unexpected rock, contaminated soil, or utilities in the wrong location, mark Block 10 “yes” and describe the issue in Block 23 in enough detail for a reader unfamiliar with the project to understand it. Writing it down later almost always means losing details that matter.

Do not skip non-work days. Even when nothing happened on site, the record should reflect that and explain why. Gaps in the log create exactly the ambiguity that fuels disputes.

1
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. ENG Form 2538-2 – Quality Assurance Report (QAR) Daily Log of Construction – Civil
2
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Engineer Forms – USACE Publications
3
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. ER 1180-1-6 Construction Quality Management
4
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. EP 415-1-261 Volume 7
5
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Government Manual Volume 3 – RMS
6
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Construction Quality Management for Contractors – Student Study Guide
7
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Contractor Manual – RMS Website