The New South Wales Government Rail sector is responsible for one of the largest and most complex transport infrastructure networks in Australia. Managing thousands of projects across the state, from track maintenance to station upgrades and major builds, the team oversees an enormous flow of people, equipment, and risk.

Over the course of a year, NSW Gov - Rail Sector manages over 1,000 individual short-term worksites, involving tens of thousands of individual contractors. Each project, no matter how big or small, requires contractors to be properly inducted, documented, and compliant before they step on site. In an environment where safety is non-negotiable and timelines are tight, contractor check-in processes need to be both watertight and efficient.

While the scale and volume of the NSW Gov - Rail Sector projects were modern and ambitious, the induction process was anything but.

Every contractor underwent a verbal site induction, followed by a series of paper-based compliance forms. For teams managing hundreds of workers across multiple worksites, this approach quickly became unmanageable.

The manual system led to:

• Delays at check-in, with inductions taking up to 10–15 minutes per person
• Significant admin burden on staff to verify documents and manage forms
• Repetitive processes, especially for contractors working across multiple sites
• Mountains of unsearchable paper records, creating risk during audits or incident investigations

Put simply: the team was spending more time on paperwork than on actual project delivery.

To address the challenge, NSW Gov - Rail Sector partnered with Sine to introduce a digital contractor management system, one that could scale across short-term, high-volume worksites without sacrificing compliance or safety.

Starting with a small trial site, the team implemented Sine Workflows, allowing them to move contractor inductions and documentation online. Instead of delivering verbal inductions and processing forms manually, contractors could now complete everything from their phones, ahead of arrival.

Staff were initially more hesitant, with it being a whole new way of managing site inductions. But as soon as they used the system, they found how easy and quick it was, making the adoption process quick. Over time, more sites were brought online, each gaining access to QR code check-in, geofencing, and automated workflows that drastically reduced friction at the gate.

Sine made it possible to establish new sites and induct contractors in minutes, all without compromising on compliance.

With Sine in place, NSW Gov - Rail Sector transformed its contractor management process from a compliance bottleneck to a competitive advantage:

Induction time reduced from 10–15 minutes to under one minute
Contractors complete forms and safety training before arriving on site, freeing up both time and headspace for actual work.

One-time workflows
Repeat contractors no longer need to redo the same steps for every site. Validations carry across jobs, as long as they meet requirements.

Contractor-led adoption
As the system rolled out, contractors began asking for it at sites where it wasn’t yet available, a rare case of compliance being something people actually want to use.

Faster site setup
New sites can be onboarded in minutes. No need to recreate induction packs or paperwork from scratch.

NSW Gov - Rail Sector’s old process ticked the compliance box, but it slowed everything down. Now, with Sine, they’ve built a contractor management system that moves at the speed of the work itself.

QR check-ins. Geofenced sites. Digital inductions. Compliance still happens, it just doesn’t happen in the old way anymore. Because when the paperwork takes longer than the job, it’s time for a better way.