Posted By Veronica Napier
Hi Marcus,

I work for Zurich Risk Services - the second largest Inspection Body in the UK.

In respect of LOLER examinations it should not be the same company who inspects and maintains the equipment. It does not matter if they have 2 different departments - the competent person is still representing this company. This is something we come across frequently with our clients and our advice is always the same - use a seperate company. As well as being impartial the other benefits of using an independent body(especially the larger ones) is that they are fully accredited and have the relevant PI / EL / PL insurance.

If you are insured with one of the large insurers then they will have a facility to arrange statutory inspections for you. I.e RSA, ACE, Zurich, or you could try HSB Haughtons or Plant Safety. These companies can inspect all plant disciplines.

Hope this helps.

Kind Regards

Posted By Veronica Napier
Dave -

I note your response. I get the feeling you don't like (or trust) Engineering Insurers! Firslty, I appreciate you know your stuff and are much more experienced than me (I have worked for ZRS for 4 and a half years and passed NEBOSH last year)however I'd just like to give my point of view. Yes it is true that the Regs only state competent person and I can see your point on this very grey area, however the fact remains in most cases the HSE and LA's prefer a company to use an independent body for LOLER, COSHH & PSSR examinations. What about maintenance companies who are not accredited or certified to do this work and who do not hold the relevant PI cover?, yes they know their plant and equipment but they are not independent. I see your point on the companies you mentioned who do their own inspections - however would this not have been subject to discussions and consultation with the HSE? I know the Regs do not specify the exact requirements however it is still good practice to use someone entirely independent from the client, plant maintenance company and manufactuers.
My company is no longer an "engineering insurer" -Zurich Risk Services are an inspection body and risk management, H&S & Occupational Heath Consultancy as well as providing NDT testing, air monitoring etc etc. The insurance is provide by Zurich Commercial now, not all of our clients are insured by ZC, indeed we have inspection contracts in force for clients of other major insurers. I can't speak for any other company however our Surveyors are discipline specfic and are constantly being trained and developed and we cover a wide range of industries. Of course there will be instances where we may not be specialised enough to examine but we will try and help. We had one client who had "A O Smith" vessels which by the nature of their design (very high, thin and can cause a lot of damage) an internal examination could not be carried out and the last inspection company carried out hydraulic testing which was not ideal - we worked together with the client and the manufacurers and came up with a method which was more effective to examine the plant (plant which if had to explode would have blew half the town up)- remote vistual inspection. Before we issued a report of thorough examination we had to satisfy ourselves of the internal condition so this is why we took it a bit further then just issuing a thorough report - if anything would have happended we would not have beebn happy that we did not properly check the internal condition. Anyway my points is that we do have the resources and ability to examine complex plant and and provide technical advice.

Anyway I am sorry to have went on - I just felt you were being a bit harsh on us "engineering insurers" - we are here to assit clients in complying with Regulations and providing advice and assistance to them. Again the HSE etc still prefer to see inspections done by independents and this is still the advice I would give to the majority of companies. ICI do their own inspections - what about Joe Bloggs Engineering who doesn' have the time, resources or sufficiently competent person to examine an air receiver / boiler and do some NDT work.

Again I very much appreciate that you are very knowledgeble and it's good to hear other peoples opinions. Hope you dont think I am being cheeky or anything..!

Kind Regards

Posted By John D Crosby
Marcus
The ACoP and Guidance Document L113 is quite clear on this.The Guidance states in para 295 that "it is essential that the competent person is sufficiently independent and impartial to allow objective decisions to be made." It then goes on to say that this does not mean having to use an external company as long as the person(s) carrying out the examinations "have genuine authority and independence to ensure that the examinations are properly carried out and that the necessary recommendations arising from them are made without fear or favour"

Suggest you refer your LA person back to the Guidance.

Take care
John C

Posted By Simon Ayee
An Inspector must make a clear distinction between legal requirments and guideance when giving writing to the duty holder (refer to the HSC or LAs enforcement policy). He/she may discuss the value of a separate competent person carrying out the thorough examination but should make it clear that this is guidance.

If the same "person" is used there could be conflicts to the benefit or detriment of the client e.g. expensive repairs not included or unnecessary work required.

Some level of evidence of the examiner not being independent and impartial would be required for formal action.

Posted By Dave Daniel
Hi Veronica

Sorry if you thought I was being a bit harsh on "Thorough Examiners". There are of course many competent and professional people who do a good job but I have to say that over the years I have had cause to question the work of SOME larger engineering insurance companies. In one case my company faced a 2 week deferred prohibition notice and was prosecuted after 1500 items of lifting tackle were apparently not inspected by the engineer-surveyor - His records were found to be a complete work of fiction, and not only at our factory! Significantly the insurer was not prosecuted. The duty to examine is on the Employer.

Since then (1988) I seem to regularly come across situations which leave me with some concern. The last one was several months ago when I found an engineer-surveyor had scheduled a passenger carrying order-picking truck for annual examinations whilst scheduling the normal fork truck for six monthly examinations - the complete opposite of what the LOLER defaults set out.

One major company also issues "reports of NON-thorough examination" which look so similar to thorough examination reports that clients regularly miss the fact that a thorough examination has not been carried out. In one case such a report had been issued for a fork truck which had moved off site, and so had not been seen at all - NO examination through or not had taken place....

You are quite right to point out that internal services can have similar problems and that proper PI insurance is needed.

The moral is if somone contracts a service, check the work's been done before you pay the dosh over!

Regards, Dave