Freelancers & Risk Assessments

[Bryson]

No problem. I know that wasn't truly your intention, just pointing out that it was pretty major thing to say about someone.

 

I have to say, that the Fast show woman is the perfect example - if you feel the need to say "no offense" you're probably being offensive, albeit unintentionally.

[David Buffham]

I think there's merit in both arguments. Brian (as always) made a really good point about risk assessments a couple of weeks ago:

 

One of the points of a risk assessment is to remove any variables from a situation. One that is well done will cover all possibilities. The art to a good risk assessment is to not make it too specific but to use it to evolve a safe method of working, whatever you are doing.

 

In the example you gave, you would not assess the risk of a gel frame getting stuck and what happens when you try to free it but break it down into two or more 'generic' situations...

 

1/. Risk of dropping objects from height

2/. Risk of working at height

3/. Risk of working on electrical equipment

4/. Risk of working with hot objects

 

With those 4 assessments and their appropriate control measures you would probably cover over 50% of all theatre related risks.

 

As an example of a good risk assessment, on the recent ABTT pyro course run by our very own Lincoln, we were given a copy of the full risk assessment done for the millenium night fireworks display on the Thames. Imagine the risks involved in that? And yet the assessment runs to under 3 sides of A4 for the whole thing including get-in, show and get-out.

 

This makes a lot of sense.

 

If risk assessments are too specific and you find yourself in a production situation where you want to do something that you hadn't envisaged, what do you do? Obviously you "mentally" assess the risk based on experience and common-sense, but do you then sit down and document your mental thoughts before doing the job? Very unlikely in most situations with time pressure etc.

 

With the risk assessments at the level that Brian mentioned, most eventualities should be covered by what you already have in writing, so you have more flexibility to deal with the unexpected. If something so major comes up that it isn't covered, then you would be unwise to go ahead with it without further planning.

 

So done properly, risk assessment on a per-job basis should not be too arduous, but there is still no need to reinvent the wheel each time. How about producing generic risk assessments for day-to-day activities, using the kind of generic situations mentioned by Brian as a starting point, and compiling these into a 'Generic Risk Assessments' document that the company/freelancer maintains? And then produce a Method Statement for each and every job, referencing which of the generic risks apply and any job-specific risk assessments that have been produced for this work.

 

There's no value in re-writing or even copy & pasting the same stuff all the time. But anything out of the ordinary should be documented and not left to 'mental' notes.

 

I also work in another industry which is certainly more safety orientated, controlled and audited than entertainment - yet our method statements are normally short and make reference to other documents including Risk Assessment, which generally don't change that often, but are always relevant.

 

At the end of the day Risk Assessment is about assessing risks, reducing the risk to as-low-as-reasonably-possible, and documenting the identified hazards, risks and mitigations. Surely as long as this has been done once you don't have to keep doing it unless the hazard and / or risk changes?

 

If you keep re-writing things then you may accidentally miss out critical risks due to paperwork-fatigue and you're no longer 'covered'.

Likewise if you're copying and pasting.

If you are maintaining a 'living' document then the whole thing evolves in a more controlled manner.

 

I believe that the quality of paperwork is more important that the quantity, and also keeping it manageable on a day-to-day basis. If the paperwork becomes too ardous then it soon won't be done anymore, and you then face the risk posed by not doing risk assessments...

 

hazard: jail sentence / fine if something goes badly wrong

risk: certain

As far as I'm concerned that's a very high score!

 

So I think the best thing is to keep things efficient; put in the thought, document it, maintain it, reference it, get on with the work with safety in mind.

[Brian]

A thought...

 

there is no legal understanding of the term 'freelancer'. As far as the Inland Revenue are concerned you are either employed or self-employed. As far as the HSWA is concerned you are an 'employee' (covered by section 2 of the Act), a contractor or the general public (both covered by section 3).

 

To quote from the HSE...

The question of whether a person is or is not an employee is a crucial question because health and safety legislation places distinct duties on:

1/. employers;

2/. people who are employed and people who are not (both self-employed and members of the public)

"employee" -is "an individual who works under a contract of employment (or is treated by section 51A as being an employee), and related expressions shall be construed accordingly";

"self-employed person" is "an individual who works for gain or reward otherwise than under a contract of employment, whether or not he himself employs others";

"contract of employment" is "a contract of employment or apprenticeship (whether express or implied and, if express, whether oral or in writing)".

Casual workers...

Casual work is where a person undertakes short periods of work with breaks in between each period when no work is offered or done. The two most common types of casual work are:

a situation where casual work is taken on for a short period, such as holiday work for students, when the hours and conditions of the work are stipulated by the ‘employer’, although this is often only verbally – here the arrangements would normally give rise to a contract of employment.

Labour-only subcontractors

Labour-only subcontracting is particularly common in the building and construction industry . In this situation, the main contractor engages the labour needed on a project by sub-contracting specific jobs to workers (sub-contractors). The legal status of such a worker depends on the normal application of the various criteria listed above. The courts have shown a willingness to overlook the fact that the worker is described as `self-employed", if the other factual circumstances actually point towards employment.

 

It occurs to me that asking 'freelancers' to provide a risk-assessment is a bit of a diversion. Under most circumstances I would sugest that they are likely to be 'employees' and the responsibility for the RA should lie with the employer.

[gareth]

So done properly, risk assessment on a per-job basis should not be too arduous, but there is still no need to reinvent the wheel each time. How about producing generic risk assessments for day-to-day activities, using the kind of generic situations mentioned by Brian as a starting point, and compiling these into a 'Generic Risk Assessments' document that the company/freelancer maintains? And then produce a Method Statement for each and every job, referencing which of the generic risks apply and any job-specific risk assessments that have been produced for this work.

 

There's no value in re-writing or even copy & pasting the same stuff all the time. But anything out of the ordinary should be documented and not left to 'mental' notes.

... which is pretty much what Bryson and myself have been saying all along, although without David's reference to method statements (which is probably a very useful thing to add to the equation at this point, by way of looking at it from a slightly different angle).

 

So, now that it looks like we're beginning to establish that a majority of us consider a mix of generic and specific risk assessments to be acceptable, and that 're-inventing the wheel' on each and every job is a waste of time, let's try to get back to the original point of this thread. How many of our members who work as freelancers are in the habit of writing their own risk assessments? And of those who contract the services of freelancers on a regular basis, which of you expect those freelancers to provide RAs?

 

Another intersting angle might be to ask, of those of you who work as venue employees (full-time or casual), how many of you have been given the opportunity to read, and comment on, the risk assessments which have been prepared by your technical management?

[David]

I was under the impression that a risk assessment had to be undertaken when there is a risk that has not been assessed. As most freelancers do the same things on most jobs and work away from base, a generic risk basement can be used, along has any new risks are assessment on site and a record made. I may be wrong but that’s the way I interpreted the guidelines.

[Guest lightnix]

I was under the impression that a risk assessment had to be undertaken when there is a risk that has not been assessed...

That´s the assumption I was working under, but will of course check this out. After all, the hazards encountered in my work remain much, if not exactly the same from job to job. Also, if I was going to be expeced to produce a fresh set of RAs for each gig, I would inevitably have to charge for the pre-production time it took to do this.

 

How many of our members who work as freelancers are in the habit of writing their own risk assessments? And of those who contract the services of freelancers on a regular basis, which of you expect those freelancers to provide RAs?

Thanks, Gareth. I´m very grateful for the masses of input to this thread in the last few days, but I also notice that my original questions have remained unanswered, here they are again...

 

FREELANCERS

Have any of you been asked to provide RAs for your work ?

Have any of you done them anyway ?  If not, why not ?

Have any of you presented RAs of your work to your clients ?  If so, what was the response ?

 

COMPANIES

Have any of you asked your freelancers to provide RAs for their work ? If not, why not and do you have any plans to ask them in the future ?

Have any of your freelancers provided, or offered to provide, RAs for their work ?  If so, what was your response ?

 

Sorry chaps, but I´m not going to let this one go just yet, so let´s have some answers. I must say that while much useful information has been given here, I´m a tad disturbed at the way the subject seems to be being "talked around" and by the lack of response from company reps. So, let´s hear it...

[gil-galad]

To make it simple:

 

If you pay your own NI, do accounts and have your own liability insurance then you are self employed.

 

If you pay your own NI but have no insurance or the company you are working for this week takes tax directly then you are a sub-contractor

 

If the company you work for takes your NI and tax at source than you are employed.

 

How does this explain RA's and liability? It doesn't!!!!!

 

Risk assessments should be done by employers and shown to employees to operate.

 

The problem is that in the eyes of the HSE employment has no link to financial employment. You are employing someone if you instruct them in the line of work.

 

e.g

You arrive at a gig and there are 6 locals to help you unload your truck. WARNING from the moment you take control of the crew YOU are responsible for their H&S and welfare.

You are responsible to make sure they are "fit for work" and are wearing the correct PPE and are adequately trained.

IF one of them drops a flightcase on his foot and crushes his little toe. He could sue you.

 

This is a problem for all of you who want to be self employed but don't want to pay for insurance.

If you are working for a sound company as a self employed noise boy then you should receive RA's from them. You should then pass them on to not only the site manager but also show them to local crew. It will be your responsibility as the representative (lead person) of the sound company to monitor and modify the RA's whilst you are on site as necessary.

 

I have made it my policy to do a Method Statement and Risk Assessment for every event as I beleive that by leading the way is the only method that really works.

With a little thought RA's and Method Statements can be much easier than you think and really will impress your customers.

As we work more and more in an industry that is driven and funded by large corporations the H&S portion is expected as standard.

[Guest lightnix]

Some excellent points there, gil-galad (welcome to the Blue Room, by the way :** laughs out loud **: ). Just for the record, there was a recent thread on Employer's Liability insurance, which kind of "overlaps" some of what you've said there.

[Chris Higgs]

Chaps,

 

I think I have posted something similar to this before, but I can't remeber where.

Sorry to repeat it..............I am trying to help, honest.

A risk assessment is a legal obligation for employers and the self employed.

It has to be done.

If there are significant risks in the business activity in question you have to write them down.

The purpose is to have looked carefully at the work and designed a safe system of work so when there is a faeces/ventilator interface it reduces the amount of damage.

People at college and new employees are unlikely to have the experience or skill to be able to carry out large scale generic risk assessments for their establishment. Moreover it is not their place to do so. I hope that we would all get involved, but I stress again, the risk assessment is required to be suitable, sufficient, up to date and in proportion to the task.

 

There seems to be a common thread running in everyone's posts about demonstrating how much experience one may have.

You can be a world expert and still get it wrong on the day. When the world expert has thought about the work and set up a way of dealing with risks to reduce them to an acceptable level, then when that unlucky event happens, the effects will be mitigated.

You can do courses on risk assessment, it will not be something you can just 'do'. It is an onward process, to be reviewed as things change and to check things are still adequate even when circumstances don't change.

You can cut and paste generic RAs, it saves a lot of leg work.

The onus is on the employer to make sure that it is adequate.

BUT THE PEOPLE DOING THE WORK ARE THE PEOPLE WHO NEED TO BE AWARE OF THE FINDINGS. THE SUPERVISORS NEED TO ENFORCE THE CONTROL MEASURES AND THE WORKERS NEED TO DO AS THEY ARE TOLD AND HOW THEY HAVE BEEN TRAINED TO DO IT.

Sorry 'bout the CAPS - is that rude?

[Paul J Need]

Just a thought..... not had time to read all of the above so forgive me if this has already been covered.

 

If as a freelancer you are asked to produce an RA surely you would need to visit the site where the job was taking place. For the sake of argument lets say you live in London, but the job is at the NEC. Does this mean you have to spend a day out arrange with the venue for access times, (and perhaps meet with the other 150 freelances engaged on the same trade show at NEC) do the walk around, fill our your RA on your clip board then come home to write up said RA before sending it off with you quotation for said job (RA attached of course) to the firm angaging you for said job????? :D not to mention production meetings wih all departments, suppliers etc etc involved so the RA coveres ALL RISKS!!!!!!!

 

Of course, you will have to charge the firm a days money, travel expenses to and from Birmingham and your time for preparing said RA :P

 

You've probably gathered by now that I think it would be a useless exercise to ask freelancers to produce an RA in the first place and, needless to say I am sure some of you are aware of my feelings towards these peices of paper which, in most cases a worthless peice of crap! Surely a mission statement or general document would suffice such as "I hereby give you, the employer, assurances that after xx years experience in the industry all work carried out shall be to the best of my ability, using my common sense, experience and knowledge, to liase with other persons on site, to work in a manner which avoids risk of harm, damage, injury to all persons, property etc"

 

Or am I STILL missing something?

[Ike]

Hmmm... two days later and no comments ?  I have to confess a little surprise and disappointment here.

 

Let´s try again...

 

FREELANCERS

Have any of you been asked to provide RAs for your work ?

Have any of you done them anyway ?  If not, why not ?

Have any of you presented RAs of your work to your clients ?  If so, what was the response ?

 

COMPANIES

Have any of you asked your freelancers to provide RAs for their work ? If not, why not and do you have any plans to ask them in the future ?

Have any of your freelancers provided, or offered to provide, RAs for their work ?  If so, what was your response ?

 

ANYBODY ELSE

What do you think ?

Most of the work I do is as an employee but on the occasions I have provided a contracted service I have never been asked to provide a RA.

I haven't sat down and produced a RA for a particular job however I do tend to have lots of notes, generic assessments and manufacturers instructions etc. lying around and I will scribble down anything of particular interest from a H&S point of view so it would really just being a case of writing them up. On a slightly different note I do have a COSHH protocol for all substances I use while working freelance.

[Big Dave]

I been discussing this with several people over the last few days. As a freelancer (sorry, self employed engineer), I have never been asked to produce an RA for a job I have been employed on.

 

The problem with it is this, in order for me to produce a full RA for any job, my client for that job would have to provide me with a full brief of the job several days before the job commences. Imagine the time required to individually brief an entire crew prior to show if you cannot get them all in one place, i.e. you do not want to pay them for their time. Also, most production companies build a cost into any job for producing RA's, indeed some employ a person just to do that specific task. Do you think they would let me bill for my time? I think not.

 

I have produced a generic set of RA covering the general work I do but unless the situation changes significantly, I cannot see producing full RA's for every job I do!

[Chris Higgs]

The point of doing the RA is to reduce risk to yourself/others.

It is not necessarily going to be something you are asked for (unless you have an accident or a spot check of some kind) by anyone.

It is your obligation if you are an employer or self employed to consider what you do and how you do it and to take whatever precautions are necessary to reduce those risks to an acceptable (the lowest possible) level that can be made.

The risk assessment need only be proportionate to the task. (Big contract, more detailed and thorough RA).

To prove you have done a risk assessment, it needs to be recorded, although it is often argued that you don't have to record anything if you employ fewer than 5 people or there are no significant risks.

 

I would suggest that if you don't feel the need to carry out a risk assessment, particularly if you work at height, drive long distances or work with electricity (that's all of you, then?) one of two situations may exist:

 

1) You aren't actually doing anything risky and there is nothing significant to deal with (difficult, because we tend to accept the risk inherent in our own line of work).

 

2) You aren't actually self employed, and as such aren't feeling 'the heat' so to speak. If you are taking on a contract, submitting a quote, placing orders and generally taking an entrepreneurial (doesn't look right, but I used the spellchecker.....)risk, you are self employed.

True, if you pay your own NI and tax, it goes some way to making you self employeed, but not necessarily. The PSA have some definitive guidance on this on their site.

If you carry your own PL, that does not in itself make you self employed, you are just more employable than someone with none. (It is a cruel world.)

From a health and safety point of view, you are often treated as an employee in the eyes of the law - someone will be directing your actions and thus may be technically your employer.

Let's have some responses to that!

[MikeR]

As a freelance engineer / operator I have never been asked to submit an RA, although I have frequently been given RAs to read and sign off on as accepted. As a freelance project manager on events ranging from small to large (£10K to £1000000K) I frequently generate RAs on behalf of my client and hand them on to suppliers, contractors & crews to read & accept. Suppliers of kit & services are also often asked to contribute to the RA & often required to sign off on their contribution upon arrival on site or before. Almost all of the RAs I have been given to read have been of a generic nature and, it has to be said, sometimes worthless as I've found that some companies will ignore risks that , although they may be applicable, are difficult or costly to address. It appears to me that companies doing this are relying on the existance of paperwork to demonstrate that their duty of care to crews and punters has been exercised.

 

For each large event I work on as a project manager I will produce a new RA. This may include sections from previous documents and probably will. It seems obvious to me that risks are often generic and so the approach to them may also be. NB use of word may. I would say that relying on previous documentation is akin to relying on experience and helps to develop best practice. Events will always offer new hazards or new combinations of hazard and so each event should, in my book, be addressed individually which is not to say that reams of paperwork need to be generated in every instance. There is of course a cost associated with pre production time to carry out risk assessment, I suppose you can take a view on this depending on the value of the work, either that offering this aspect of project management is value added or that the value to the client outweighs the expense, either way the assesment needs to be carried out.

 

Sorry for rambling, 2 final points.

1 Risk assesment is a team activity and an ongoing one at that. No self respecting rigger, LD, chippie or any other would take the view that an RA exists therefore I will carry on with x or y unsafe operation regardless of whether he or she has been asked to provide an RA or not.

2 As mentioned above risk assesment is an ongoing activity which runs throughout the life of an event. A generic RA is a good starting point, but it must be reviewed (on an ongoing basis) and ammended as required for each event. I would suggest that while an RA in the back of the mind is better than no RA, one formalized on paper is better still and I would have thought approaches some kind of best practice.