Hi – without knowing the details of the improvement notice or the HSE’s thinking or your HAVs history it’s difficult to know any reasoning, but possibilities may be Initial I.N. complied with but that was just a ‘stop-gap’ for an immediate issue and they want more details about how you manage HAVs overall? Recent HAVs RIDDOR submitted (currently duty bound to investigate these)? Specialist occupational health inspector involvement? (FFI :)?)

SPR If the inspector visited earlier this month and considered that your organisation had complied with the IN, his/her intention to return next week seems somewhat odd. Though forum users can make all sorts of speculations in response to this thread, the only person who can give a reasonable answer is the inspector! Therefore, why not try contacting him/her to ask for clarification about the purposes of the visit. As a pretext you could say that your boss or the boss's boss has asked you to check. This might elicit more information although the inspector may not be obliged or willing to give it. It's possible that the inspector is returning with a notably less experienced colleague and using your organisation's circumstances to improve his/her training about HAVS. Also, perhaps HSE has a special initiative/campaign regarding HAVS this year and inspectors are required to visit a number of organisations to complete questionnaires as part of an information gathering exercise. As an example HSE had such an exercise regarding management of asbestos in schools about 2 years ago. Another possibility is that the inspector's boss now thinks the inspector should have pursued a prosecution as well as issuing a IN regarding the shortcoming/s found last October - possibly to boost the team's tally of income through FFI. In addition to keeping a tally of how much money each inspector generates through FFI, HSE probably keeps a tally for each team of inspectors makes. Team leaders, usually principal inspectors, receive annual appraisals just like their subordinates do and may well be told in future that their teams have performed well as regards expected FFI income or need to improve their figures! One important question: What sort of evidence, if any, did the inspector obtain last October to justify serving the IN? If very little or no evidence was obtained then and it becomes apparent next week that the inspector is starting to gather evidence for a prosecution, you or someone else could ask in passing why evidence wasn't gathered last October, and then add that this aspect could be raised by your organisation's lawyers during any future legal proceedings. This might help to persuade the inspector or his/her boss to think twice about the wisdom of pursuing a prosecution. In any event, if prosecution is pursued, your organisation will be able to point out to a court that it did take appropriate and sufficient measures to comply with the IN.

Wow Graham, that's an awful lot of speculation from you! But just one of those many imagined circumstances bears further comment. If an inspector is planning a visit simply to take the opportunity to train a junior then a decision must be made regarding access. Don't feel obliged to provide that access and don't waste time pampering to that freeloading. I dealt with a similar occurrence when the Environment Agency sent two juniors to a client's site to 'inspect'. Their first words were to the effect of 'we don't know what this is all about, so you will have to help us'! They were pleased to receive an hour or so of my time, as an impromptu tutorial, and were then shown smartly off the premises. I subsequently sent EA an invoice for training costs, and to nobody's surprise this nonsense from then on was nipped in the bud. There is no reasonable circumstance for a regulator to use commercial premises for training purposes without a formal request and explicit permission. Costs may be involved and should be reimbursed. I've seen it happen too often. In these litigious days, and with a straight answer being less than likely, keep careful records of what is said and done. Nobody wants to cause trouble and later find themselves deeper in the mire. It may be a legitimate visit, or a legitimate visit coincidentally combining a training opportunity. But if it really is just a discourteous imposition for staff training purposes dressed up in the guise of a legitimate inspection then feel free to hit back and say no. And if it is the combined purpose, keep very careful time records also. Reject FFI charges for the training component and/or demand evidence of how and where those hours have been separately accounted and not charged.

ian.b You're right - Though the main gist of my response at #4 was to suggest contacting the inspector I couldn't resist indulging in some speculation myself about possibilities. With the limited information available and appropriate on a public discussion forum like this one, some speculation in responses is inevitable. If the inspector does return next week with a colleague it might be the case that some training/education of the colleague is involved. Another possibility is that any accompanying colleague might be the inspector's boss or boss's boss monitoring his/her performance or perhaps someone who specialises in HAVS and interested to get more information about how SPR's organisation dealt with the shortcomings which prompted the IN. This latter suggestion is prompted by experience during my time with HSE of taking specialists to premises which had devised effective systems for dealing with excessively noisy machinery. This resulted in photos and descriptions of the systems being included in nationally published guidance. Also, most of the employers involved were agreeable to their names and locations being included as credits to accompany the descriptions of the particular systems, e.g. a low cost but effective enclosure with viewing panels for a textile machine. Your experience of the Environment Agency (EA) sending two juniors to a client's site certainly doesn't reflect well on the EA or at least the EA manager who sent the juniors. By contrast, it was standard practice when I was with HSE - and probably still is - for an inexperienced inspector to accompany a more experienced one as part of "on the job" training/education from time to time. Also, I think it's true to say generally that trainee inspectors on their own didn't inspect premises which were likely to be too complex or specialised for them to deal with effectively. Also, you seem to have a negative perception that some HSE visits are purely for training purposes. If two HSE inspectors pay a visit, there might be an element of training involved if one of them is significantly less experienced. However, the training element surely would be secondary to the main purpose of the visit such as inspection or investigation. On a wider note, training/enhancement of knowledge and experience is important for all professionals, irrespective of role, status and experience - which, for example, underlines why IOSH members are subject to IPD and subsequently CPD.