Every agency comment cycle gets a matrix. It is simultaneously your to-do list, the reviewer’s re-review roadmap, and the project’s legal memory of who agreed to what.
The columns
| No. | Page/Sheet | Agency comment (verbatim) | Response | Revised location |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | p. 12, Table 4 | paste the comment exactly as written | Concur. Growth rate revised to 2.0%. | p. 12, Table 4; App. C |
- No. — the agency’s numbering if they numbered; otherwise number sequentially and never renumber between rounds.
- Page/Sheet — where the comment points (their reference), not where your fix landed.
- Agency comment, verbatim — paste, don’t paraphrase; a paraphrased comment lets you accidentally answer a different question.
- Response — one of the three postures below, then what you did.
- Revised location — page/sheet/table where the reviewer can SEE the change; “revised throughout” makes them hunt and makes them grumpy.
The three postures
Wording lives in Wording Bank and Email Patterns — grow it from responses that survived review.
- Agree: “Concur. [Change] has been made; see [location].” Do the change everywhere it echoes (a fixed number in Table 4 also lives in the text and Figure 6).
- Clarify (no change): “The analysis reflects [X] per [source §]; no change proposed. Additional detail added to [location] for clarity.” Answer the question they were really asking, and usually add a sentence to the document anyway — a comment asked once will be asked again by the next reader.
- Disagree: rare, polite, sourced: state the standard/data supporting your position, offer the alternative you’d accept, and flag it for the PM BEFORE the matrix goes out. A junior engineer never sends a disagreement the PM hasn’t seen.
Warning
Never silently skip a comment. Every row gets a written fate — even “Comment noted; no change required because…” An unanswered row reads as either evasion or sloppiness, and it hands the reviewer a free second-round comment. Same rule as redlines: Redline Response Workflow (“zero silent skips”).
Round hygiene
- Second round: add a column or suffix (1a, 1b) rather than editing first-round rows — the history must stay readable.
- Ship the matrix WITH the resubmittal, and make the transmittal email say what changed at a glance.
Practice question: reviewer comment #7 contradicts comment #12 from a different department — what goes in each Response cell, and who do you call first? QA/QC reminder: before sending, walk each “Revised location” cell and confirm the change is actually there in the final file — a matrix pointing at unrevised pages torches credibility.
See also: Wording Bank and Email Patterns · Redline Response Workflow · Workflow - TIA from Request to Submittal