Streetwork Administrator

A Streetworks Administrator handles the paperwork and permits behind any digging or works on the public highway - the notices, permits and road space bookings that utility companies, telecoms firms and contractors must submit to a local highway authority before they can open the road. The job sits in the back office: you raise and track applications through specialist streetworks software, chase missing information from site teams, and make sure works are registered, extended or closed on time so the employer avoids fines. You work either for the organisation doing the digging (a utility, telecoms or civils contractor) or for the council on the other side of the desk, assessing incoming applications.

Starting salary: £22k–£28k
Live graduate jobs: Search all jobs
Main way in: Direct entry from any degree into an administrator or…
They usually ask for: No specific degree subject is required and the subject…

Approximate graduate salary

Typically around £22,000–£28,000 to start, though this varies widely by employer, sector and location - London and roles with specific streetworks experience or NRSWA qualifications tend to sit at the higher end, and local authority posts follow council pay scales rather than market rates.

What you'd actually do

Raising permit and noticing applications on streetworks systems (commonly used packages include things like Symology, Elgin, Causeway or a council's own portal) with the correct works category, traffic management type, start and end dates, and location references
Monitoring an inbox and work queue for permit refusals, modification requests and comments from highway authorities, then correcting and resubmitting applications before the site team's planned start date
Phoning or emailing site supervisors and gangs to find out what is actually happening on site - whether works started, whether they will overrun, whether the excavation has been backfilled - because permit records must reflect reality
Submitting works start, works stop, interim and permanent reinstatement notices within statutory time limits, and registering the details of the reinstatement (size, materials, depth category)

Show 3 more

Flagging works that are at risk of overrunning so an extension or variation can be applied for, since overrunning without permission triggers charges from the authority
Running reports on compliance - late notices, works without permits, failed inspections - and chasing the responsible supervisors to resolve them
Dealing with inspection outcomes, defect notices and section 74 or fixed penalty notice (FPN) correspondence, gathering evidence such as photographs and site records to challenge or accept them

How graduates get in

Direct entry from any degree into an administrator or coordinator vacancy at a utility, telecoms or civil engineering contractor - this is by far the most common route, and many postholders do not have degrees at all, so graduates compete with experienced administrators
Moving across internally from a general admin, customer service, planning or scheduling role within the same company once you understand how the business works
Temp or agency placement into a streetworks or noticing team, which is very common in this part of the industry and often converts to a permanent contract
Graduate schemes in utilities, telecoms infrastructure or highways consultancy that include a rotation through streetworks, permitting or network operations - less common, but these exist and are a faster route to the technical side

Show 2 more

Entry on the local authority side as a streetworks or permitting officer/assistant, usually advertised directly by the council rather than through a graduate scheme
Apprenticeship routes (business administration, or highways/utilities-focused standards) which some employers run alongside direct hiring

What employers ask for

No specific degree subject is required and the subject genuinely does not matter - employers hire from any background. Many adverts ask only for GCSEs including maths and English, or A-levels, so a degree is often more than is strictly needed
Strong administrative and IT competence, particularly Excel and the ability to learn a specialist database quickly - this is usually tested more seriously than academic record
Some employers ask for or will fund the NRSWA (New Roads and Street Works Act 1991) qualifications - the Street Works Qualifications Register units. The supervisor/operative units are more relevant to site staff, but understanding the legislation matters for the office role
A working knowledge of the Traffic Management Act 2004 permit schemes and the national Code of Practice for noticing is usually learned on the job rather than required upfront

Show 2 more

Experience of working to statutory deadlines or in a compliance-driven admin environment is valued; previous streetworks experience makes you a strong candidate immediately
A driving licence is occasionally asked for where the role includes site visits, but many of these jobs are entirely office or hybrid based

Skills that matter

Attention to detail under volume

A wrong postcode, works category or date on a notice can invalidate a permit and cost the employer a fixed penalty, and you may be processing a large queue of them daily.

Reading and applying rules and codes of practice

Streetworks is governed by statute, national codes and each authority's own permit scheme conditions, so you constantly have to check what is allowed rather than guess.

Chasing people who are busy elsewhere

Site supervisors are on the road and not thinking about paperwork, so getting accurate start, stop and reinstatement information out of them is a daily negotiation.

Working to hard deadlines

Notice periods and notification windows are set in law - a notice that is a day late is non-compliant regardless of the reason.

Competence with specialist systems and spreadsheets

Almost all of the work happens inside a streetworks management system, and reporting on compliance usually means pulling and cleaning data in Excel.

Diplomatic written communication

You are regularly disputing charges or explaining overruns to a local authority inspector whose goodwill affects how future applications are treated.

Putting these on a CV? We counted which skills 12,914 live graduate adverts ask for, and what to do with the answer — part of our application advice.

Where it leads

Streetworks Administrator or Noticing Administrator - learning the legislation, the software and the employer's own network
Streetworks Coordinator, Permit Coordinator or Senior Administrator - owning a region or a client contract, handling disputes and FPN challenges, and checking others' work
Streetworks or Permitting Team Leader / Manager - managing a team, reporting on compliance performance to the business, and dealing directly with authorities on scheme-level issues
Branching sideways into works planning and scheduling, traffic management coordination, network or highways operations, or a council streetworks/permitting officer role (and vice versa - movement between contractor and authority side is common)
Longer term, routes into contract management, compliance or regulatory roles within utilities and infrastructure. Timescales vary a lot: some people move up within a couple of years in a busy contractor, others stay in the same role for many years, and there is no structured national progression ladder for this job

What people get wrong

“It is outdoor or site-based work involving roadworks.”

It is almost entirely a desk job. The closest you get to a hole in the road is a photograph attached to an inspection report, although some employers include occasional site visits.

“'Administrator' means low-stakes filing and data entry.”

The notices you submit are statutory and the deadlines are legal ones. Getting them wrong exposes the employer to charges from highway authorities and can stop a work crew from starting, so the role carries real commercial consequence.

“It is a generic admin job you could do anywhere with no learning curve.”

Streetworks has its own dense body of legislation, codes of practice and locally varying permit schemes, and people who understand it well are genuinely in demand across utilities, telecoms and councils.

“A degree is the normal entry point.”

Many people in these roles came in through temping, apprenticeships or internal moves. A degree can help you progress faster into coordination and management, but it is not what gets you shortlisted.

Where this varies

The job looks quite different depending on which side of the fence you sit. Working for a utility, telecoms or civils contractor, you are applying for permission and defending the company against charges; working for a local highway authority, you are assessing other people's applications, setting conditions and issuing the charges. Scale matters too - in a small contractor you may do noticing, planning, reinstatement records and inspections all at once, while in a large utility or telecoms rollout the work is split into narrow specialisms (noticing, permits, FPN disputes, reinstatement). There is also real regional variation: permit schemes and their conditions are set locally, London boroughs and Transport for London tend to be the strictest, and the legislation differs in Scotland (where it runs under the Transport (Scotland) Act and the Scottish Road Works Register) and in Northern Ireland, so experience does not transfer perfectly across the UK. Recent years of large-scale fibre broadband rollout have created a lot of these roles in the telecoms supply chain, and demand there can be cyclical.

Search Streetwork Administrator jobsFrom employers' own careers sites, updated daily Tailor your CV for this roleFree with an account, 3 a month

General guidance about the role across the UK market, not about any specific employer. Entry routes and requirements vary — always check the individual job advert.