Posted By Diane Thomason I've been asked this: 1. Under LOLER regulations, what/who determines the classification of someone who is "competent" to operate a crane? 2. Is there any regulation or guidance as to what type of crane, weight being lifted or work situation that requires a crane operator to be professionally certified? There are small portable cranes for up to a few hundred kg and and a couple of ceiling mounted gantry type cranes that will lift up to 1000 Kg. Can anyone advise what BS 7121 says about competence for operators of this type of crane? I don't have access to BSs here. It's only operators and appointed persons I'm interested in, not the competent person who does the examinations. I'm particularly interested in the "professionally certified" bit. Though perhaps that should be "professionally certificated"! Diane

Posted By The toecap Good afternoon, 1. Competence can be by the following, experience, knowledge, training etc. But there is a scheme called the Construction Plant Competence Scheme. (CPCS). This is one way of demonstrating competecne and training. But there are others. There's the national Plant Operators scheme (I think) There used to be the CTA scheme but this is no more. As for The weight limits. This is purely down to what the operator has been trained on. The operator must receive some form of formal training on a certain machine to enable them to become familiar with that machine. But very generally the principles are the same. I hope this helps. If not let us all know and we can find out other info' from some experts that are out there

Posted By Terry Jones Hello Diane Have a look at this website, you will find it very useful for questions such as yours. www.lifting-world.co.uk

Posted By Diane Thomason Many thanks Terry and Andrew, Diane