Posted By Dean Stevens I've noticed a lot of old ground being covered lately. Smoking regs / WAH / COSHH etc. Now i personally know about the search forum function and use it reguarly, especially before asking before advice. People that do not come on here as often or are new are obviously unaware of this feature so they ask questions that have been asked in the past, now this doesn't neccesarily give them the best chance of some good proffesional advice, i can guarantee that there will be proffesionals out there who would not want to answer because 1. They have already responded to similar post in past or 2. They just cannot be bothered because the issue has been discussed before. How about IOSH categorizing all past posts into an index type feature, so if i wanted to come on here and ask " Is this RIDDOR reportable?", i could then go to the RIDDOR section which would contain all past posts regarding RIDDOR. I know this would take a little work IOSH's end but i'm sure it could be worthwhile in the future. As i said...Just a thought.

Posted By Frank Newman I regret that we do get a little impatient with those who ask the same question over and over again. However, this does requires some patience on our side. As consultants we move from site to site to site and frequently find the same or differing levels of knowledge or of competence. And so we have to deal with the those levels of knowledge or of competence, which can be enormously variable (from "sack 'em" to "promote 'em"). And we have to recommend to senior management the best ways of dealing with such questions. The same applies to this site. Many of those who post questions here are new to the profession, may have been dumped with a question or problem by senior management and may not, generally, actually, have the current competence to deal with the problem. They ask for our help. We help. to the best of our knowledge, experience and competence. We should remember our first six months on the job. We all needed help. Nowadays we have 5, 10, 20 30 years on the job. But don't forget when you, personally, really didn't know what it was all about. Today, with this web-site and the many others that are out there, our access to knowledge is so much better. Either we answer them directly from our own knowledge and experience or we guide them to appropriate sources of information. We do not criticise or laugh at or criticise the beginners. Merv

Posted By garyh Not all people who post queries are beginners; some experienced people "know" the answer but want a 2nd (3rd,4th.....) opinion. Anyone who thinks that they know it all and that there is no other point of view, is probably wrong.