There is no fixed interval for a PUWER inspection. The Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 (PUWER) require inspection after installation where safety depends on how equipment is installed, and at suitable intervals and after exceptional events where it could deteriorate dangerously. The Health and Safety Executive expects you to set that frequency through risk assessment.
A new starter asks why the bandsaw guard gets checked weekly and the pillar drill monthly. If nobody can say, the likely explanation is that somebody set those intervals years ago and nobody has revisited them since.
Under Regulation 6 of PUWER, that is the problem. The interval, the choice of inspector and the format of the record are all for the employer to decide, and each is a decision an inspector can ask you to justify.
What a PUWER inspection is for
HSE's guidance on inspecting work equipment, last updated in October 2024, states the purpose plainly. An inspection identifies whether work equipment can be operated, adjusted and maintained safely, with any deterioration detected and remedied before it becomes a health and safety risk.
That scope is narrow. The inspection asks whether the equipment is capable of safe operation. Whether it is being operated safely day to day is a separate question, and it belongs to supervision and training.
That distinction matters when you decide what an inspection should cover. It should concentrate on the safety-related parts necessary for safe operation, which in some cases means testing or dismantling. Different safety-critical features on the same machine may need inspecting at different intervals.
Not everything needs a formal inspection
HSE is explicit that not all work equipment needs formal inspection, and that in many cases a quick visual check before use is enough. Inspection becomes necessary where significant risks arise from incorrect installation, reinstallation or deterioration. Risk assessment decides what you need.
HSE gives three tiers as illustration:
- Quick checks before use: electric cable condition on hand-held power tools, functional testing of brakes, lights on mobile machinery
- Weekly checks: presence of guarding, function of safety devices, tyre pressures, and the condition of windows, mirrors and CCTV on mobile plant
- More extensive examinations every few months or longer: general condition of a ladder, close examination of a safety harness, portable appliance testing
Records are not normally required for the simplest pre-use checks. Any PUWER inspection checklist, and the records made from it, should be tailored to the specific equipment. The aim is to keep the burden to what safety requires.
When more inspection makes things worse
The instinct when a regime feels thin is to inspect more of everything, more often. HSE warns against exactly that. Requiring too much detail too often makes inspection burdensome, and the result is a superficial tick-box exercise or, in some cases, the inspection activity stopping altogether. In HSE's words, you only need to inspect what is necessary for safety.
Who can carry out a PUWER inspection
PUWER asks for a competent person to carry out inspections, and that person can come from within your own organisation.
HSE's PUWER guidance is that equipment can be inspected by anyone with sufficient knowledge and experience of it to know three things: what to look at, what to look for, and what to do if they find a problem. The level of competence required scales with the type of equipment and how and where it is used. A trained operator running pre-use checks on a hand tool meets that bar. A complex guarded machine will not.
PUWER does not define a competent person, which is why the question keeps coming up. HSE's guidance on training and competence points to the Approved Codes of Practice, which describe the attributes for both PUWER and the Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998 (LOLER).
The two competences
HSE draws a distinction that is easy to miss. The nature of the inspections does not have to be determined by the same person who undertakes them, provided the person determining them is competent. So there are two separate competences here. One decides what gets inspected, how, and how often. The other performs the inspection to that specification. A maintenance technician can hold the first competence without the second. A regime can run for years without anyone having held the first role.
Designing the regime can often be done in-house by experienced staff, according to HSE. They can draw on manufacturer recommendations, industry advice and their own experience of the equipment, the workplace and the people using it. Where that competence needs developing, our training partner The Knights of Safety Academy offers a free certification in PUWER risk assessment, which includes tutorials on creating PUWER assessments in Safety365.
Setting an interval you can defend
Frequency is determined through risk assessment, taking account of manufacturer recommendations, industry advice and your own experience. Environmental conditions matter too, since equipment exposed to harsh outdoor conditions deteriorates faster and needs a shorter interval.
The interval can change over time, lengthened where inspection history shows negligible deterioration and shortened where experience shows it is needed to prevent danger.
That makes your inspection records the evidence base for the interval. When did anyone last read yours that way? An organisation that has inspected the same twelve machines monthly for four years without finding a defect already holds a strong case for a longer interval.
What makes an interval defensible
Write down the reasoning at the point you set it, covering the manufacturer's recommendation, the conditions the equipment works in, and what happens if it fails. Record who decided it and confirm they were competent to. Set a separate date to review the interval itself. Then check your findings history before each review, since a run of clean inspections supports a longer interval and repeat defects call for a shorter one.
What the record has to show
Regulation 6(3) requires the result of an inspection to be recorded, and HSE confirms the record should be kept at least until the next inspection of that equipment.
Records can be kept in writing or electronically. According to HSE, records kept in another form, such as on a computer, should be held securely and made available on request by an enforcing authority.
Work equipment that requires inspection should not be used unless you know the inspection has taken place. In practice, a supervisor on a Tuesday afternoon has to be able to check that quickly. Where would yours look?
Equipment that arrives from somewhere else
Regulation 6(4) is the duty that catches out hire, contractors and multi-site operations, and it runs in both directions.
Where equipment leaves your undertaking, or arrives from another one such as a hire company, it should be accompanied by physical evidence of the last inspection. An inspection report is one option, and for smaller items HSE suggests tagging, colour coding or labelling.
Colour coding suits anything arriving in volume, since a coloured band or tag lets a supervisor confirm the last inspection at a glance. The same principle applies to your own equipment moving between sites, and the same duty appears again in LOLER for lifting equipment.
Keeping a PUWER inspection regime in one place
PUWER inspection asks you to track which equipment needs formal inspection and which needs only a pre-use check, the interval for each and the reasoning behind it, and who is competent to design the regime and who is competent to run it. It also asks you to know when each item was last inspected and what was found, which defects are still open, and which items are off site or newly arrived and need their evidence checked.
Most of that is record-keeping, so PUWER compliance depends heavily on the register.
Our PUWER Assessment system holds the equipment register, schedules inspections against each item, tracks defects through to resolution and keeps the records exportable when an enforcing authority asks. Assessments are built on PUWER-aligned templates, and where the risk belongs to a specific activity, task-based risk assessments cover that ground. In the Accelerated Compliance approach, the inspection record is what shows an inspector the rest of the system is working.
If you are still working out which regulations apply to which equipment, start with what PUWER covers and who it applies to.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is there a minimum interval for PUWER inspections?
For most work equipment, there is none. HSE expects the frequency to come out of risk assessment, based on the manufacturer's recommendations, industry advice and your own experience of the equipment and the conditions it works in. The interval can also change over time, and may lengthen where inspection history shows negligible deterioration or shorten where experience shows it is needed.
Who can carry out a PUWER inspection?
Anyone with sufficient knowledge and experience of the equipment to know what to look at, what to look for and what to do if they find a problem. The level of competence needed scales with the equipment and its use, and the inspector can be a member of your own staff.
Can an operator inspect their own equipment?
Yes, for pre-use checks and routine visual inspections, provided they have the knowledge and experience to meet the same three-part test. Higher-risk or more complex equipment calls for deeper competence.
Do PUWER inspection records have to be on paper?
No. HSE accepts records kept in other forms, including electronically, provided they are held securely and can be made available on request by an enforcing authority.
What is the difference between a PUWER inspection and a LOLER thorough examination?
They are separate duties with separate records. A PUWER inspection is set by risk assessment with no fixed interval. A LOLER thorough examination applies to lifting equipment at six or twelve month intervals depending on the equipment, or in line with a written examination scheme. For lifting equipment, the LOLER examination takes the place of the PUWER inspection, though PUWER's other duties still apply.
Every interval on your register should come with a reason someone can explain. If you want to talk through how your inspection regime would stand up, speak to our team.
Safety & Compliance Experts
The Sevron team brings decades of combined experience in health and safety compliance, risk assessment, and workplace safety solutions.
Reviewed by
Dale Allen
CEO & Founder
