Let me get this right in my head. Your client employs a contractor to come onto his site to repair a damaged roof for example. The contractor will put in a cost / quote to be paid by your client as part of this he submits his RAMS prior to the works commencing. Your client then reviews these prior to the works (which is their duty) to ensure they are suitable, which he then charges the contractor for as well as charging for issuing them a PTW!? Your client may as well just say, come and do some work for me, but I'm going to charge you for the privilege!? If this is the case, 2 things will happen. a) The contractor will tell your client where to go b) The contractor will put his price up to cover the additional charge by your Client.

Could this new trend be a the start of a privatised form of Fee For Intervention? Rodger Ker

It does sound like a client organisation being silly, but possibly makes sense to the parts of the client organisation if they have their own budgets (that is, if the RAMS-reviewing part needs to work to a budget but doesn't have the mechanism to charge the part that wants the roof repaired (eg) for doing the review). I don't think it's a H&S issue. It is simply contractual. It depends what's in the contract - if that says the client organisation can charge to do this it is entitled to charge. Conversely, if the employed organisation says that it will pass on such charges it can do so. Our terms normally say that where permits or approvals are required then any fees paid to obtain them will be charged to the client at cost. They are written anticipating statutory or external fees (eg, if we need a road closure or something to do the work) but would apply here - so if the client charged us to issue a PTW, we'd pay it and then charge that charge to the client.

Thanks all for your observations, clearly not a common phenominom and one which I hope the client thinks long and hard about. I agree its more of a contractual issue than a strict H&S situation and in this case it's a 'very strong' client who may be able to persuade his supply chain to his way of thinking. I'll report if there are any interesting developments. Thanks again Nick