Scaffold inspection records

When inspections are required

Three triggers apply and all three must be satisfied, not just the seven day one.

• Before first use, after installation or assembly in any position.
• At intervals not exceeding seven days from the last inspection.
• After any event liable to have affected its strength or stability: high winds, heavy snow, impact by a vehicle or load, or any alteration, addition or partial dismantling.

An inspection regime is only half the answer, because you also need working at height rescue plans for when something goes wrong.

Who is competent to inspect

The inspector must have the knowledge and experience appropriate to the type and complexity of the scaffold. For a basic tube and fitting or system scaffold, a CISRS Scaffolding Inspection Training Scheme card or an equivalent qualification is the usual evidence. For a complex or designed scaffold, the inspector needs the corresponding advanced competence and access to the design drawings.

The competent person can be employed by the scaffolding contractor or by the user. What matters is that they are genuinely able to identify defects and have the authority to stop use. An inspection signed by someone with no authority to take the scaffold out of service is not an effective control.

On a notifiable job the regime should be described in the construction phase plan.

What the record must contain

Schedule 7 of the Regulations sets out the content of an inspection report. It must be completed before the end of the working period in which the inspection took place and provided to the person on whose behalf the inspection was carried out within twenty four hours.

• Name and address of the person for whom the inspection was carried out.
• Location of the work equipment inspected.
• A description of the equipment inspected.
• Date and time of the inspection.
• Details of any matter identified that could give rise to a risk to health or safety.
• Details of any action taken as a result.
• Details of any further action considered necessary.
• Name and position of the person making the report.

Handover, tags and taking it out of use

A handover certificate at the point the scaffold is completed and released for use is not a legal requirement, but it is standard practice and it evidences the before first use inspection. Scaffold tagging systems help control access, provided the discipline holds: a green tag on an incomplete lift is worse than no tag at all.

If a defect creates a risk of a fall, the scaffold must be taken out of service until it is fixed. Physically prevent access, do not rely on a note. Record the defect, the immediate action and the fix.

Design, loading and the common failures

Scaffolds not built to a recognised configuration such as those in the NASC TG20 guidance must be designed by a competent person, and the design must be available on site. Overloading with materials, unauthorised removal of ties or braces to get plant through, missing brick guards, incomplete edge protection and inadequate base support on soft ground are the failures that recur in prosecutions.

The user of the scaffold, not only the erector, has duties. If your operatives adapt a scaffold, you have altered it, the seven day clock resets and a new inspection is required before it is used again.

Keeping the paperwork straight

Reports must be kept on site until the construction work is completed and then retained at an office for three months. In practice, keep them longer: a scaffold inspection record is often the first document requested after a fall, and three months is easily inside the period in which a claim can arrive.

Digital records with photographs attached are now widely accepted and make the seven day discipline much easier to police, because a missed inspection shows up as an overdue item rather than as a gap in a folder that nobody opens.

Common questions

Do mobile tower scaffolds need seven day inspections?

Yes if a person could fall two metres or more. Towers moved to a new position also need a pre use inspection each time they are repositioned.

Does a scaffold under two metres need inspecting?

The formal recorded inspection duty applies at two metres and above, but the general duty to ensure work equipment is safe still requires a pre use check.

Who keeps the inspection record, the scaffolder or the contractor?

The person for whom the inspection was carried out keeps it, normally the principal contractor, and it must be available on site.

Related guides

• working at height rescue plans
• construction phase plan