Hi, I am after some advice. We manage properties and will sometimes need to carry out a visual inspection on flat roofs or plant and equipment on flat roofs. This could be as part of regular visual checks or accompanying a fire or general risk assesor. Some of the roofs have edge protection, which is great, and some have other precautions such as fall restraint cable systems and some have nothing.

Generally we access the roof through a central doorway or hatch. We are not walking around much on the roof and always keeping several meters from any unprotected edge (so no need to use the fall retraint). We are not doing any physical work on the roofs, this is visual checks on the condition.

Basic WAH courses don't tend to cover this activity at all and courses like the Sage roof access course, which is 3-days long include fall arrest and rescue techniques which is way over the top. I am working with facillities managers and surveyors, not engineers and we are not going to go anywhere near an unprotected edge.

Does anyone know of a suitable course for this level of type of activity risk management?

Thanks, Brod Paul

Your Risk Assessments and their controls should cover the kind of information you are seeking:

1) Extremely windy day - do not access

2) Frosty day - do not access unless trained in and using fall restraint

3) Suitable footwear must be worn - no smooth / leather soles, stilletos or high heels

Why would you want to fill someone elses bank account?

To add to what has already been said, also consider potentially fragile elements of the roofs such as glass or plastic roof lights. You might not need to go close to the edges of the roof but you might be passing alonsgside materials that are likely to give way.

Noting that some plastic rooflights might not be fragile when installed but become so over time.

P

I am glad 2 users found the replies useful otherwise my post would have been totally wasted.

I find the comments on trainers being 'in it for the money' very offensive. I have delivered IOSH, NEBOSH and BSC training courses both around the UK and internationally for many years and whilst I expected to be paid (as I am sure most IOSH members would), I was not there to line my pockets, but because I do this for a living and am passionate about what I do. There are good and bad trainers just as there are good and bad consultants and good and bad H&S advisors.

I wasn't after advice on what the risks from working on roofs might be. I have been Head of H&S for Housing Associations and have been carrying out fire risk assessments on high rise complex buildings for a long time. I know what to look for on a roof.

But I am working now for a business that has a lot of surveyors and property managers spread over a wide geographical area and at the same time as worrying about the work at height I have a whole host of other high risk areas to urgently address. I would love to deliver all the training myself, but that will not be physically possible.

Advising me on what to include in a bespoke training course that I could deliver was not really answering the question at all. I will arrange some IOSH managing safely courses for managers and not worry about the money going into the IOSH bank account from licensing each course. I could deliver this myself but part of management is about keeping focussed on the bigger picture. 

I know that competence is far more than just passing a course, but just as we sent first aiders, fire marshals and fork-lift drivers on standard courses (and hopefully follow up with the bespoke bit on 'this is how we do it in this building' afterwards), I was looking for something similar for roof access.

There are thousands of blocks of flats and other buildings around the country that often have poor access controls and if someone knew of a good training company that had already put the work into setting out a good course with a good knowledge test at the end, I would be happy to put some money into the training company's bank. Developing training from scratch takes about 5 hours work for every hour of delivery, so the cost isn't necessarily excessive when compared to my time.

Thanks for taking the time to answer anyway, Brod

I appear to have miss understood your OP and appear to have caused offence - maybe you need to consider how you phrased your question, look to what you asked and then consider the responses you received.

Hi Peter,

I am not an expert on the topic, but over the last 5 years or so, I have probably visited between 50  and 100 flat roofs per year, carrying out FRA’s, audits or general risk assessments of managed buildings. My knowledge on managing safety on flat roofs initially came from you, back in 2006, when I was an H&S advisor for Croydon Council, covering construction and property management and you came all the way down from Scotland to help us sort out how we were going to manage all the flat roofs with plant that the Council owned.

I mentioned edge protection because there is a worrying trend that I see a lot, for developers to put a cable fall restraint system on roofs rather than actual edge protection. The buildings I have visited invariably don’t have staff trained in the use of the cable system (I always ask) or the harnesses and lanyards. it is frequently just an expensive trip hazard. Also I mention edge protection because despite all the other hazards, it is an item that protects everyone without requiring any training (just the information, instruction and supervision).

As things stand, a lot of people, including me, often find ourselves trying to do dynamic risk assessments, where the property management company have no real understanding of their roof or what should be in place. If we cannot gain access because things are not right, they end up with a rubbish FRA or General Property Risk Assessment because the roof has not been covered. You just get a really annoying phase along the lines of ‘Roof not assessed as there was no safe access’, which you see over and over again on FRA’s.

But it was not the advice that I found offensive, it was the digs at training companies:

‘Why would you want to fill someone elses bank account?’

‘Trainers(who of course are in it for the money)  tend, as you have said,  to  either provide very generic training which they can sell to anybody or everybody, or very technical stuff which they charge the earth for.’

As an associate trainer I put my heart and soul into every course I deliver. I research the company first and talk to them about their needs and I really try to influence attitudes and culture. I have no idea what clients are paying, I am on a day rate as I am with auditing, FRA’s and consultancy, which is fine, but I won’t ever get rich. I am not paid if sick or on holiday or if there is no work this week or for CPD etc. but that’s fine.  I would say it is my choice, but actually, in my case it’s not. I have PTSD which sometimes leads to long periods without being able to work, and I cannot expect an employer to take me on, no matter how qualified, with Mental Health issues.

But there are some very good trainers out there doing it for the right reasons and improving safety, not filling their bank accounts.

Also, with the comment:

‘Why do you expect training to exist for every eventuality?’

I actually think that around the country we have thousands of flat roofed blocks with plant that needs regular access, many of which are not well understood by the property managers. Many are with local authorities, housing associations or private FM companies and it is often easier to bring in a trainer to cover the basics than it is to find the time to write and deliver your own version.

A course that covers WAH from the point of the property manager or a course covering dynamic risk assessment from the point of someone visiting roofs would be extremely useful. And that was my question. Did anyone know of one?

I didn’t ask anyone to risk their PI insurance with advise on how to manage the risks on roofs. I asked very specifically about a training course.

To be told that I shouldn’t expect training to exist for every eventuality and I should put together the training myself was not helpful. I wish I had the luxury of that much spare time. I am on my own trying to move a company from somewhere that is not good right across the board for H&S to somewhere where I can sleep at night. If I end up writing and delivering this training, I am not spending the time setting up the mechanisms to get everyone involved in developing the whole SMS, which is what is needed. A quick point in the direction of a suitable course was all I was looking for.

I do appreciate people taking time to answer questions. But answers should not be offensive to a sector of our industry. There are some extremely good trainers out their.

Quote.

"Based on the date you give, I still live in the same 4 storey property in Glasgow. Problems of access to do roofwork haven't gone away and are not likely to anytime soon*. The probability of anyone having an off the shelf training package for a roof of my type is close to zero - your problem is more semi-generic but still the chances are low, UNLESS you can find e.g. a property manager with a similar portfolio who has gone through the same exercise as you are doing."

Absolutly spot on Peter. I am currently looking at roof work within our portfolio of buildings - So far i have 4 different "Permits to work" on them because of the very different features on 4 of them. However on some i have no specilist precautions what so ever because of the access, edge protection etc which make working on them no more dangerouse than on the ground. (unless we were looking at renewing the edge protecion)

No single training course could have covered this.