---
title: "Legionella flushing record sheet: free template for little-used outlets"
source_url: https://legionella.io/articles/legionella-flushing-record-sheet-free-template-for-little-used-outlets/
canonical_url: https://legionella.io/articles/legionella-flushing-record-sheet-free-template-for-little-used-outlets/
pillar: "Monitoring, Flushing & Sampling"
summary: "Download a free Legionella flushing record sheet (PDF and spreadsheet) for little-used outlets, plus exactly what to log per outlet so the evidence holds up."
primary_keyword: "Legionella flushing record sheet"
date_published: 2026-01-25
date_reviewed: 2026-06-26
author: "Legionella.io editorial team (REMOTE TECH LTD)"
reviewed_against: "HSE L8 and HSG274 guidance"
region: "United Kingdom"
license: "(c) REMOTE TECH LTD. Quote freely with attribution and a link to source_url."
---

# Legionella flushing record sheet: free template for little-used outlets

A flushing record sheet has one job: prove that the tap, shower or hose nobody uses got run for long enough, on the right day, by a named person. If it cannot do that under questioning, it is decoration. Below is a blank template you can copy into a spreadsheet or print, plus the columns that actually earn their place.

Little-used outlets are the classic weak point. Water sits still in the branch pipe, warms towards the temperature range Legionella likes, and the only thing standing between that and a problem is someone turning the tap on regularly and writing it down. The writing-down part is where most sites come unstuck.

## Why the sheet exists at all

Flushing breaks the stagnation. Running an outlet draws fresh water through the dead leg and the fitting, so bacteria never get the undisturbed warm time they need to multiply. The record is the evidence that it happened — and under ACoP L8, monitoring and the actions you take in response are exactly the kind of thing a duty holder is expected to record and keep [1].

For little-used outlets, the general expectation in HSG274 is regular flushing, commonly weekly, though your risk assessment sets the real frequency for each outlet based on how it is used and what it feeds [2]. A guest washroom flushed weekly and a rarely-touched emergency shower may not sit on the same schedule.

So the sheet is not bureaucracy for its own sake. It is the difference between "we flush" and "we can show this specific outlet was flushed on these dates by these people."

## The blank flushing record sheet

Copy this into a spreadsheet (one row per flush) or print it as a grid. Each column below is doing real work — drop one and you weaken the evidence.

**Header block (fill once per sheet):**

- Site / building name and address
- Responsible person / duty holder
- Outlet schedule reference (links to your asset register)
- Month and year the sheet covers
- Target flush frequency (from the risk assessment)

**Per-flush rows:**

- **Date** — the actual date flushed, not the date you wrote it up.
- **Outlet ID** — the unique reference from your asset register, not "upstairs sink". Two basins in one room need two IDs.
- **Outlet type** — tap, shower, WC, hose, eyewash, etc.
- **Flush duration** — minutes the outlet ran.
- **Run to temperature?** — for hot outlets, did it reach the expected hot temperature; for cold, did it run cold and stable. A simple yes/no or the reading.
- **Initials** — the person who did it, legibly.
- **Action / notes** — anything off: tap seized, no hot water, low flow, smell, repair raised.

That last column is the one auditors read first. A sheet of flawless ticks with no exceptions over a whole year looks less credible than one with the odd honest "no hot water — job 4471 raised."

### A worked example row

Date 14/06/2026 | Outlet ID GF-WC2-HWB | Type wash hand basin | Duration 2 min | Run to temp? Y (51°C hot) | Initials JM | Notes — none.

State temperatures only as what your risk assessment specifies; flush hot outlets until the temperature stabilises towards the supply, and cold until it runs cold, with the actual figures set by your assessment and local guidance [3].

## The field checklist: what to do at each outlet

Use this at the tap, in order. It is deliberately verb-first so it works on a phone screen or a clipboard.

- **Open** the correct outlet — check the ID against the sheet before you run anything.
- **Run** it for the assessment's stated duration, minimising spray and aerosol (open gently, point showers into the tray).
- **Feel or measure** the temperature: hot should get genuinely hot, cold should get genuinely cold and stay there.
- **Watch** the flow and the water itself — discolouration, smell, sputtering air all get noted.
- **Record** the date, duration, temperature outcome and your initials before you leave the room, not at the end of the round.
- **Raise** a job for anything abnormal and write the reference in the notes column.
- **Move on** only once the row is complete.

Do the recording at the outlet. The single biggest cause of worthless records is "I'll fill the sheet in back at the office" — by then three outlets have blurred into one and the times are guesses.

## How to use and store the completed sheet

One sheet per month per area keeps things readable. File completed sheets where the risk assessment, scheme of control and asset register live, so an assessor can follow one outlet across months without a treasure hunt.

Keep them. L8 expects monitoring records to be retained for a defined period — confirm the retention period your scheme of control specifies rather than guessing [1]. The point of retention is trend-spotting: an outlet that keeps appearing in the notes column with "low flow" or "slow to heat" is telling you something the single tick never will.

For the underlying programme behind the sheet, see [How to implement a flushing programme for Legionella control](https://legionella.io/articles/how-to-implement-a-flushing-programme-for-legionella-control/) and the outlet-specific practice in [Flushing little-used outlets: best practices](https://legionella.io/articles/flushing-little-used-outlets-best-practices/).

## The items people skip

The columns that quietly vanish are always the same three. The temperature outcome — because feeling the water takes ten extra seconds. The unique outlet ID — replaced by a vague room name that an auditor cannot match to the asset register. And the notes column, left blank because nobody wants to admit a fault on paper.

In my view, a record with honest exceptions beats a perfect-looking one every time. Perfect ticks across hundreds of rows are the signature of pencil-whipping — filling the sheet without doing the round — and experienced assessors know it.

## Paper sheet versus an auto-logged digital task

A paper sheet is free, works without a signal, and anyone can use it. Its weaknesses are real: it can be back-filled days late with no way to tell, initials are unverifiable, a missed outlet leaves no alert, and trend analysis means manually reading months of grids.

A digital flushing task in L8log closes those gaps. The schedule pushes the week's outlets to whoever is on the round, each completion is time-stamped to when it was actually entered, a skipped outlet flags rather than silently disappearing, and the audit-ready history is searchable by outlet in seconds. The asset register and the flushing record stop being two separate documents that have to agree.

The pragmatic call: paper is fine for a single small building with a handful of outlets and a reliable caretaker. Once you have multiple buildings, multiple people, or a regulator who wants evidence on demand, the time spent transcribing and chasing paper usually outweighs the cost of logging it digitally from the start. More on the record-keeping rationale in [Keeping records of flushing and sampling activities](https://legionella.io/articles/keeping-records-of-flushing-and-sampling-activities/).

This is general guidance, not a site-specific scheme of control. The exact outlets, durations, temperatures and frequencies that belong on your sheet come from a competent person's risk assessment of your actual system — treat the template as a starting structure to adapt, not a finished compliance document.

## FAQ

### How long should I run each outlet when flushing?

Long enough for the water to fully turn over and reach a stable temperature — hot running genuinely hot, cold running cold. The precise duration is set by your risk assessment for each outlet, not a fixed number; record the actual minutes run in the duration column so the evidence is specific [3].

### Do I need a separate row for every single tap?

Yes, where outlets are flushed individually. Each outlet should have its own unique ID and its own line, because a single line covering "all basins" cannot prove any one of them ran. Grouping is only safe where the risk assessment explicitly treats outlets as a single flushed group.

### What if an outlet had no hot water or was faulty?

Write it in the notes column and raise a repair job with a reference. Recording the fault is not a failure of the sheet — it is the sheet doing its job. A blank where a problem existed is the worse outcome, because it hides a trend that retained records would otherwise reveal [1].

## Related reading

- [How to implement a flushing programme for Legionella control](https://legionella.io/articles/how-to-implement-a-flushing-programme-for-legionella-control/)
- [Flushing little-used outlets: best practices](https://legionella.io/articles/flushing-little-used-outlets-best-practices/)
- [Keeping records of flushing and sampling activities](https://legionella.io/articles/keeping-records-of-flushing-and-sampling-activities/)

## Sources

[1] HSE, "Legionnaires' disease. The control of legionella bacteria in water systems - ACoP and guidance (L8)". https://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l8.htm
[2] HSE, "Legionnaires' disease: Technical guidance (HSG274)". https://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/hsg274.htm
[3] HSE, "Hot and cold water systems". https://www.hse.gov.uk/legionnaires/hot-and-cold.htm