Edited by user 14 October 2025 19:17:18(UTC)  | Reason: Not specified

Long post - short answer.

No I would not require a WAH permit for employees working from a proprietary (inspected) scaffold.

I’d probably say I’m with Roundtuit on this. If your planning process achieves the same outcomes, safe planning, supervision, and effective controls, which it most likely does if done correctly, then you may already have ticked the boxes that Steve outlines as being satisfied by a permit.

In the introduction to HSG250, it states that not all hazardous work requires a permit and that a permit is not a substitute for good risk assessment and planning.

I would step back and look at the whole process and environment. This is non-routine work, and depending on various factors specific to your workplace, that would probably determine if a permit system is needed as a control measure.

However, as mentioned, if this is about ticking boxes and remaining compliant, then those requirements should already have been addressed during the planning stages.

I misread the OP and can't seem to edit my post.  Don't disgaree but both your assumptions seem to say it is recorded elsewhere...if it isn't then this may be the only route open to the OP.

As an ex inspector i only looked for permits where specific actions were needed short term to allow works to be undertaken, so for example temporary measures for fire safety while hot works are being undertaken. Working from scaffolding in my opinion is adequately covered by the Work at Height and Management Regs, so as long as you can show adequate risk assessment, training, scaffolding carried out and inspected by competent people etc I'm not sure what the benefit of a permit would be.

HSSnail raises some good points given this is a leak on a bitument tank.

Were there any hot works that would necessitate a permit?

Did the operators enter the tank to effect repair requiring confined spaces consideration / permit?

Were lines broken to disconnect the tank from supply and / or process? In some sectors this is an unusual activity also supported by permit to ensure what has been split is adequately re-assembled (and tested).

Roundtuit, I am the Forum user who suggested to Jam52 that they repost but on the Public Forums to get more traffic.

I think the question was much better formatted when posted on the Members’ only Forums, as it was set out in more easy to read language complete with paragraphs, bullet points, some bold font etc.

At a quick glance, Jam52 has done a straight cut and paste from one thread to the other and the way these Forums are set up, the formatting used in drafting doesn’t transfer over into a Forum thread UNLESS someone takes the time to put in all those paragraphs, bullet points, alternative font etc.

However, Jam52 has omitted three words after the words “bitumen spill”. These were “at a quarry” and that does give us an idea of the legislative framework that applies. 

Yes, the thread is about a tank containing a chemical and scaffolds are often erected at tanks e.g. in Petrochem, but scaffolds are rarely the No 1 issue when it comes to preventing e.g. a big bang, and the sorts of reasons why Permits might be valuable.

In my response on the other thread I also commented:

          “However, this is a variant on a question that has been asked before, most recently at             Should Mobile Scaffold Towers Be Included in Temporary Works Register?

          From that you will be able to work out my view on your question.”

So, I am not going to repeat what I wrote on the Mobile Scaffold Towers thread but rather address the arguments made by Jam52, which stevedm has reinforced [in their first response].

Both Jam52 and Steve refer to the requirement in WAH Regs 2005 for work at height to be “properly planned, appropriately supervised and carried out in a safe manner.”

However, that is not an exact reproduction of what Regulation 4 of WAH 2005 says as the words used in this thread finish with “safe manner” rather than the words used in Reg 4 “manner which is so far as is reasonably practicable safe”, noting that the qualification of “so far as is reasonably practicable” will ALSO apply to the requirements for planning and supervision, already worded in the Regulation by the qualifications “properly” and “appropriately”.

Part of the argument put forward is reliant on guidance in HSG250 but the full title of that document is “Guidance on permit-to-work systems: A guide for the petroleum, chemical and allied industries” and I am far from convinced that a scaffold adjacent to a bitumen tank at a quarry is comparable to the sorts of scenarios the authors of HSG250 might have had in mind.

However, even in HSG250, HSE is not saying you MUST have a Permit to Work in operation if building a scaffold.

At paragraph 17 the guidance comments:

“17 More specifically, the following are examples of types of job where additional permits or certificates (eg isolation certificates - see Appendix 2) should be considered:” ]My bold]

…before a list of 14 bullets of which the 12th is “work at height”.

Possibly worth noting that the last bullet is the inevitable catch all that is put into any such list whilst the one before suggests that a PTW should be considered for” any operation which requires additional precautions or personal protective equipment (PPE) to be in place”

Given that you would find difficulty in finding any site in the “petroleum, chemical and allied industries” where some form of PPE is not required as soon as one leaves the office, the implication of translating the word “considered” to e.g. “done” would mean that every single task done would require a Permit.

Does anyone think that this is what HSE meant in HSG250 - or is the keyword “considered”.

Perhaps in some Petrochem site there is some ageing plant where safety sensitive equipment is mounted at the top or side of a tank containing extremely flammable liquids or gases and that equipment is NOT adequately protected against accidental impact. In such circumstances a Permit might be sensible but not so much for the simple process of erecting a “system” scaffold but to ensure that the erection does not compromise the safety of the tank and its equipment.

This is a bitumen tank at a quarry. Entirely different risk profile from a tank containing e.g. toluene in a chemical works.

Perhaps notable that the word “height” is used just ONCE in HSG250. If WAH was an issue where Permits were often considered by HSE to be needed at the types of sites that HSG250 is aimed at then, you might reasonably expect to read more about WAH in that document.

Next, if we look at the main source of HSE published guidance on WAH, INDG301 “Working at Height: A brief guide”, it has precisely NO references to Permits.

Which translates as indicating that HSE does NOT think that Permits should be the norm when erecting proprietary scaffolds up to a height of 5 or 6m (relatively low).

The wording in WAH 2005 is actually less stringent as it does including the “reasonably practicable qualification than the equivalent wording in LOLER Regulation 8:

1. Every employer shall ensure that every lifting operation involving lifting equipment is —

(a) properly planned by a competent person;

      (b) appropriately supervised; and

      (c) carried out in a safe manner.

Would anyone advocate that a Permit is needed before someone gets in a passenger lift?!?!

There are plenty of other ways of complying with Regulation 4 of WAH 2005 other than simply mandating the use of PTWs every time.

Finally, what does the HSE have to say about when Permits might be needed in the Approved Code of Practice and Guidance, L118, supporting the Quarries Regulations 1999?

Unlike WAH 2005, or the sector specific legislation for construction, CDM 2015 (and its previous iterations), the Quarries Regulations actually devote a Regulation to Permits to work (Reg 18).

In the guidance on Reg 18 HSE comment in L118:

152 Examples of work at a quarry likely to require a permit include:

(a) entry into confined spaces or other danger areas designated under regulation 22;

(b) entry into machinery (eg mixers) where isolation or locking-off procedures are insufficient (see paragraph 146) to ensure the safety of workers;

(c) work on complicated or high-voltage electrical systems.

NO mention of work at heights, nor even of what are usually far more risk activities at quarries such as blasting operations , the use of large earth moving equipment, or even making sure that piles of quarried material don’t collapse.

UNLESS there is some particular reason why a Permit SHOULD be needed, I don't think that demanding a PTW for erecting, using and dismantling a smallish system scaffold alongside a bitumen tank at a quarry is anything but overinterpretation of the regulatory requirements and supporting guidance.

Edited by user 15 October 2025 16:00:19(UTC)  | Reason: Typo