Rank: Super forum user 
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Just had an asbestos survey back from a new asbestos surveyor, four building similar.
Q: Would my fellow health and safety practitioners allow employees work on all four building if one came back as strongly presumed?
The reason I ask this is, if it just so happened that the employees accidentally disturbed asbestos from this one panel, all the rest being fine, where would this leave us as a company legally?
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Rank: Forum user 
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Perhaps the reason for a lack of response to this post is that we don't understand what you are asking.
Let us see if we can clarify, and please correct me if I am wrong in my supposition.
Paragraph 1. You have had four similar buildings surveyed. What was the purpose of the survey? Were these "Management Surveys" or "Refurbishment or Demolition Surveys?"
Paragraph 2. You state "-one came back as strongly presumed". One what? One sample, one area, surely not one whole building.
Any Management asbestos survey carried out may contain the assumption that a particular area "is strongly presumed to contain asbestos" because it was not accessed for some reason.
If the survey report states that for the whole of the building, it is a very strange survey indeed.
If an area has been "strongly presumed" to contain asbestos, I would expect that is should have had a suitable asbestos warning label attached.
As for your third paragraph, you will need to elaborate, I don't understand what you are asking.
I can only presume you are stating that one panel has been identified as containing asbestos. If that is the case, and it has not been marked as such, there is a strong possibility that someone could (if they did not consult the asbestos register/survey) disturb this material.
If that were the case, you could have some legal issues to face.
Regards
Rodger Ker
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Rank: Super forum user 
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'Strongly presumed' is a phrase usually only used when the surveyor is confident a material contains asbestos but can't sample it for whatever reason. any less confidence and it would just read 'presumed'
I would be extremely weary of using the report from one building to advise you on another. even if they're identical you have no way of knowing what has been added or taken away in the years since construction.
Let's say for example that at some point in history that AFB panels have been removed from all four buildings. In the one you've had surveyed the clean-up was well done and no dust with fibres in it was found afterwards.
What if the other three weren't cleaned up as well?
You would be exposing your staff and wouldn't have a leg to stand on in court.
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Rank: Super forum user
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Might also have sampled similar elsewhere and saved on the costs of sampling and analysis by presuming similar material to be an ACM.
Then if you do all you would need to do if the material had been confirmed to be an ACM, you'll be OK.
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