Snagging

Snagging is the process of identifying and listing minor outstanding or defective items — snags — for rectification before or shortly after handover, typically recorded on a schedule worked through by the contractor.

Snagging is quality control at the finish line: the walkthrough, the list, the chasing. It is contractually lighter than it feels — a snag list is not a certificate, and refusing practical completion over a list of genuinely minor items is the misuse the forms guard against — but it is where the standard of the last two per cent of the job gets agreed.

In new homes the term carries statutory weight beyond custom: the new-build snagging inspection industry exists because buyers have a short window and a builder\'s own process to push against. In commercial work it is simply the working end of the specification.

Related: practical completion · retention