Posted By William O'Donnell I am looking to pick the brains of the experts out there. We have the situation where our services will be carried out across many varied premises. These may be owned or leased by us, or shared with other Employers. Often the premises may be occupied only by our staff but these will be from a variety of different Departments/Services. Staff may be sited there permanently, or in and out during the day. To add to the mix, they may not be there every day, holding specific clinics on specific days. The staff are spread over a large geographical area in over 50 buildings. The problem is in identifying who is in charge with regards to H&S? Individual Managers may or may not take responsibility for their own staff, but there is no one in overall control. There will often be no designated Fire Marshals or premises first aid personnel, and when asked to co-ordinate such arrangements everyone's response is "that's not our responsibility". Can any one out there point me in the right direction towards any relevant Statutory Requirements/Guidance or how others have addressed this problem. Thank you

Posted By Ron Hunter You need the buy-in and commitment of the Board (Directors/Trustees, whatever)and a clarification of Policy to ensure that there is a "designated occupier" for all you significant premises. These "designated occupiers" (for want of a better term - maybe "person in charge of premises" if you like) need not spend all of their time in the building/campus, indeed they need not necessarily be based there at all. Nevertheless, these people (and where necessary their Deputes) and their (unshirkable)duties must be clearly identified- in your Policy! Most often, there is a split between a Senior Manager with the H&S responsibility and a Facilities Manager having premises- related maintenance responsibility (asbestos, legionella, etc) sometimes with overlap to ensure local monitoring actions are actually conducted.