Posted By Mark Mace
Recently have been visited by HSE, the gentleman informed me that my Safe working practice & risk assesment for Workplace transport was too detailed and would be difficult for the average employee to understand.

I was hoping somebody might have one i could look at to see where i am going wrong.

I am well aware that these will be very site specific, i carry out training with regrads to vehicle movements, pedestrian areas etc.

Posted By Andrew Brown
Mark

Was your risk assessment 'suitable and sufficient' otherwise? I wouldn't advise you to simplify your risk assessment.

I favour using the risk assessment as a management document in some instances, identifying all the issues you have considered and showing your decisions. You can therefore be as complicated as suits your needs.

I would then produce a separate simple toolbox talk, poster, site rules, etc for the employees covering the bits relevant to them.

Posted By Robert K Lewis
This is alwys the devil and the deep blue sea problem that HSE inspectors love to flag up but know that if it is simplified and something happens they can say you had not covered enough of the risks in the assessment.

The reality is that few people retain much more than 5-6 bullet points, sorry button point for the pc persons, without reading as they go. Therefore without significant training input and the incorporation of the controls fully into the task process anything more complex has no real use.

It is a challenge for not only risk assessment but also for worker competence wrt H&S on the job. I rather suspect the inspector may be challenging you to demonstrate how this complex assessment will be used and monitored during work. It is at this point that we should begin to see the value of "dynamic" assessment in its true sense of assessment as the task proceeds by the operative undertaking the task.

I have also encountered the sort of comment made when the inspector believes the assessment is generic rather than specific but that is another thread.

Bob