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Does my tipping skip need testing?

18th, February 2022

Tipping Skip testing is highly recommended to ensure that they are still PUWER and LOLER compliant. We advise that your Tipping Skip is thoroughly examined on a six-monthly schedule by a trained Conquip on-site engineer.

Below we outline the importance of testing for the safety of site personnel.

  • What is it that makes a Tipping Skip require testing? Does my Tipping Skip even need testing?
  • Does the testing required depend on what I am using my Tipping Skip for?

These are all common questions that, as a manufacturer, we often get asked. So we’ve decided to put pen to paper, so to speak, to try and help clarify.

We’ll start with a statement:

All Autolock and Forklift Tipping Skips supplied by Conquip Engineering Group are covered by the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations (PUWER). All cranelift options are also covered by the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 (LOLER).

So this means that every tipping skip supplied by Conquip (standard Forklift Tipping Skips and the Autolock Tipping Skips) are already tested to PUWER and LOLER standards when you purchase or hire from us. According to these regulations, every type of tipping skip should comply to PUWER, but if a tipping skip is able to be lifted by crane with goods or materials in, it should also be covered by LOLER, which is a more specific, stringent compliance.

However, the initial testing and inspections that we carry out on our products before they are purchased or hired doesn’t last forever. The tipping skips will need re-testing throughout their lifetime to ensure they continue to be safe to use.

When it comes to safety and prevention of accidents, you can never be too careful. You never know what the tipping skip has been used to lift or carry before, or how it was used. Don’t take the risk; check.

6-monthly Tipping Skip Inspections

In line with PUWER and LOLER’s ‘suitable intervals’ statement, Conquip Engineering Group recommends that all tipping skips (Autolock Tipping Skips and Forklift Tipping Skips) are thoroughly examined on a six-monthly schedule by a trained Conquip on-site engineer.

FIND OUT: What happens to your tipping skip during inspection?

To help explain what requires a tipping skip to be tested and where the responsibilities lie, we have pulled out some relevant references below from the various regulation documents that apply.

PUWER Regulation 6 states:

Every employer shall ensure that, where the safety of work equipment depends on the installation conditions, it is inspected:

1. After installation and before being put into service for the first time, or
2. After assembly at a new site or in a new location to ensure that is has been installed correctly and is safe to operate.

Every employer shall ensure that work equipment exposed to conditions causing deterioration which is liable to result in dangerous situations in inspected:

1. At suitable intervals, and
2. Each time that exceptional circumstances which are liable to jeopardise the safety of work equipment have occurred.

To ensure that health and safety conditions are maintained and that any deterioration can be detected and remedied in good time.

LOLER Regulation 9(3)(a) In-service Thorough Examination states:

Under Regulation 9(3) employers choose whether to have a thorough examination of lifting equipment either at set intervals as specified in the regulation, or according to an examination scheme.

The competent person needs to examine thoroughly the parts of the equipment specified within the examination scheme these should include the parts that are subject to wear and tear, and deterioration and which could lead to dangerous situations.

Employers are required to produce:

  • Either a written examination scheme, or
  • A current examination report (if following a specified period approach to the carrying out of a thorough examination).

HSE’s Approved Code of Practice states:

136 Where the risk assessment under Regulation 3 of the Management of Health & Safety at Work Regulations 1992 has identified risk to the operator of other workers from the installation or use of the work equipment, a suitable inspection should be carried out.

141 The extent of the inspection required will depend on the potential risks from the work equipment. Inspection should include, where appropriate, visual checks, functional checks and testing.

148 You should ensure that the persons who determine the nature of the inspections required and who carry out inspections, are competent to do so.

149 The competent person should have the necessary knowledge and experience.

318 The examination scheme may be drawn up by the user, owner, manufacturer or some other independent party, provided they have the necessary competence.

319 The examination scheme drawn up by the competent person should identify and specify those parts of the lifting equipment that should be thoroughly examined.

320 The examination scheme should specify the intervals at which the lifting equipment (or individual parts thereof) should be thoroughly examined and, where appropriate, those parts that need to be tested.

321 Any examination scheme for lifting equipment should take account of: (a) Its condition, (b) The environment in which it is to be used, and (c) The number of lifting operations and loads lifted.

322 The examination scheme need not necessarily be preserved in the form of a document. It should however be capable of being reproduced as a written copy when required. It should be secure from loss or unauthorised modification and it should be authenticated by the competent person preparing the scheme.

323 You should inform the competent person of any changes in use of the lifting equipment which may affect the examination scheme either: (d) Where these changes have occurred since the last examination was carried out, or (e) Are expected to occur before the next thorough examination is due.

324 The competent person should decide what changes may need to be made to the examination scheme.

325 Different items or parts of the lifting equipment may be thoroughly examined at different intervals, taking into account the degree of risk associated with each item or part.

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