I’m looking for advice on legislation regarding maintenance and testing of a passenger lift.

We currently use a well-known international lift company for maintenance and regular upgrades but recently another specialist advised us that we should have the lift inspected and tested by independent engineers appointed by our insurance company and issued with test certificate, possibly up to twice a year.

I have checked the guidance issued by HSE on maintaining passenger lifts and there is no such reference to insurance companies providing independent inspection.

Our insurance company have never requested we arrange for a test certificate despite regular site inspections.

When I ask the lift company why they have not advised of this requirement they informed me, and I quote “we have been advised by the HSE we are not obliged to tell you”!

I have been through LOLER a few times and I can’t find any such reference regarding passenger lifts.

Can anyone point me in the right direction please?

Regards

Mike

Hi Mike
it is normal for your insurance company to carry out a full inspection of your lift once a year, your insurance company pay for this inspection as its assurance for them that the lift is compliant and safe for use.

Have a look at LOLER 9 (3)(a)(i)

Our insurers send a very nice man in to do them every 6 months

Andy

Hi, the HSE have produced an interesting leaflet - Thorough examination and testing of lifts
Simple guidance for lift owners. http://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/indg339.pdf

Role of the dutyholder
As the dutyholder you are legally responsible for ensuring that the lift is safe to use
and that it is thoroughly examined. These responsibilities include:
■■ maintaining the lift so that it is safe to use;
■■ selecting and instructing the competent person;
■■ ensuring that the lift is examined at statutory intervals (every 6 or 12 months) or
in accordance with an examination scheme drawn up by a competent person;
■■ keeping the competent person informed of any changes in the lift operating
conditions which may affect the risk assessment;
■■ making relevant documentation available to the competent person, eg
manufacturer’s instructions and maintenance records;
■■ acting promptly to remedy any defects;
■■ ensuring that all documentation complies with the Regulations; and
■■ record keeping.
Selecting a competent person
A competent person is someone who has sufficient technical and practical
knowledge of the lift to be able to detect any defects and assess how significant
they are. It is also important that the competent person is sufficiently independent
and impartial to allow them to make an objective assessment of the lift. For this
reason, it is not advisable for the same person who performs routine maintenance
to carry out the thorough examination, as they are then responsible for assessing
their own work.

The thorough examination
The law requires that all lifts when in use should be thoroughly examined:
■■ after substantial and significant changes have been made;
■■ at least every six months if the lift is used at any time to carry people, every
12 months if it only carries loads, or in accordance with an examination
scheme; and
■■ following ‘exceptional circumstances’ such as damage to, or failure of, the lift,
long periods out of use or a major change in operating conditions which is likely
to affect the integrity of the equipment.

Many thanks for the responses so far.

Alex: This only recently came to light and I've not had a reply from the Insurance company. I was also taken aback by the lift companies response to why they have not advised us of the requirement, if this is indeed a legal one.

Motorhead: It states that it should be examined but as far as I can understand, by a competent person which could be our maintenance company, not specifically an independent engineer appointed by your Insurance company.

I was wondering if anyone could give me a specific reference in LOLER that states this requirement.


Mike

Mike, it is not essential to have an "insurance inspection" and there are plenty of competent lift engineers who are not employed by insurers, although many employers do choose to use their insurers for the thorough examination.

Often your insurer will require evidence that your lifts have been subject to the thorough examination by a competent engineer but they will not insist that it is done by them.

It is good practice to separate the maintenance function from the inspection function: that way the inspection report can be seen to be objective with no hint of generating remedial income-generating work for the service company.

The lift company's response is rather worrying and would make me think carefully at contract renewal stage.

Gentlemen several years ago the basic regs for lift inspections were all changed and the system for thorough inspections by a competent person became slightly confusing and most Lift Companies were waiting for the clarifications of how we were to determine who was the competant person. The old system was like a vehicle mot, and was clearly structured with works to be inspecte on a LG1 year, LG3 year and LG5 year basis. Lift service engineering companies quoted for the works serperately and when appointed carried the works out, they then issued all relevant certificates which were accepted by Insurance companies, it was called the"LG" inspection process.
Now its generally accepted that the Insurance company engineers who carry out the 6 month inspections are the competant persons and issue reports to the client with works require shown in the relevnt sections, these range from minor works thro to H&S works which are required to be dealt with within a certain time period.
My understanding is that there are possible discussions a foot to maybe change the system back to the LG Inspection system, who knows if and when this may happen but what chance the end user has in getting to grips with it all, if the Lift Industry are frustrated with it all!

Anything that lifts persons requires a 6 monthly examination.

I think you've already been given all the information you need, but just to re-iterate, and from the point of view of an enforcement officer (which I am) then if I visited your premises and discovered a passenger lift, I would be looking for evidence of regular maintenance and also a 6 monthly Certificate of Thorough Examination, compliant with Schedule 1 of LOLER. It doesn't *have* to be carried out by your insurance company, but that is the most common way these are carried out in my experience. It could be done by the lift maintenance company, but again, in my experience, the Certificates issued by those companies rarely contain all the information stipulated by Schedule 1 AND if you look at the Guidance item 295 on Competent Person, it states "It is essential that the competent person is sufficiently independent and impartial to allow objective decisions to be made", which is the reason why I generally wouldn't advise using the maintenance company to do the Thorough Examination.