RAMS
Also called Risk assessment and method statement, Method statement
RAMS is the paired risk assessment and method statement a contractor produces for a task: the risk assessment identifies the hazards and the controls, and the method statement sets out the sequence of work those controls are built into. RAMS covers how a task will be carried out, a lift plan covers the lifting operation itself, and a temporary works design covers whether the thing being loaded can take it.
In practice
Placing and recovering crane mats is a task in its own right, and it is the one that most often falls between documents. The lift plan covers the lift; the temporary works design covers the mat under load; the manual handling, the placing sequence, the interlocking and the recovery afterwards belong in the method statement, and nobody else writes that. Module weight is the fact deciding whether the section is honest, because a mat that can be set out by hand and a mat needing plant to place are two different method statements.
Where this comes from: UK contractor practice. RAMS is a working term for a documentation package rather than a named instrument, and what it must contain is set by the project and by the contractor’s own risk assessment duties.
Where it matters on site
A supplier can give you inputs and cannot give you the document. We publish a datasheet, a product risk assessment and per-configuration technical drawings for ALIMATS, which is the material a method statement is written from. What we cannot write is your sequence, your access, your site or your crew — and a supplier’s risk assessment pasted into your RAMS unchanged is a supplier’s assessment of the product, not your assessment of the task.