Rank: Super forum user 
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I have a difference of opinion with an insurer and wish to seek other opinions.
The company are carrying out a monthly self-inspection regime which is effective and has been in operation for some time now. My advice is that records should be kept for 12 months whilst the insurer is asking for these to be kept for up to 10 years.
This is simple observational stuff (housekeeping, storage of flamm/haz materials, exit routes, use of PPE etc), not statutory records. As this regime is designed to primarily detect simple workplace and behavioural issues that are addressed very quickly and secondly to demonstrate good practice I believe it achieves both these objectives by keeping a year's rolling history. 10 years is a lot of paper!
What do others think please?
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Rank: Super forum user 
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If this is an EL insurer I would suggest 3 years - the normal maximum time in which a claim for damages can be brought - is reasonable. Ten years seems way over the top to me too.
Does depend on what's actually contained in the inspection record though. If it simply shows that an inspection was carried out then why not record it in an Excel spreadsheet using one line for each inspection?
All you need to to is put the date, place inspected, person inspecting and a brief summary of the findings. I kept records of DAILY walkround inspections like this over a three year period with one company and the record could be retained more or less indefinitely. Took me about 2 minutes each day to type up.
If you have to keep the paper record, why not just scan it?
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Rank: Forum user
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This sort of stuff is very useful for establishing "due diligence". I always recommend 5 years for these sorts of records because one year's records would, in my view, be insufficient to establish a regime of good practice. I think 10 years is excessive.
Of course these days it doesn't have to be paper, the documents can be scanned and saved to a hard disk. If you do it this way I find it is best to scan and save the docs. on the day that they were compiled, it only takes a few more minutes whereas left for a month or two it's a chore that few people would relish.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Scanning is an option I hadn't thought of. Thanks both.
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Rank: Forum user
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And if you didn't have them in the first place would they have asked for them to be introduced. I often see 'requirements' from insurers risk surveyors that are not a statutory requirement.
Keeping 10 years of records does seem excessive though!
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Rank: Forum user
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I'm with the three year camp but for an additional reason. Think how firms change. It may seem slow day by day or week by week but if you were to get out the oldest reports I bet you would be surprised how many issues have been overtaken by change. Process/plant/product/personnel changes make older reports of rapidly decreasing value.
And on scanning - when did you last look for that computer file that you know you last saw in about 2001? Find it??? Really???
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