Workplace Health & Safety Audits and Inspections – Is there a difference?

When working in Workplace Health & Safety (WHS), ensuring compliance with safety laws and regulations, and the identification of potential workplace hazards is critical. WHS Safety audits and inspections are crucial tools for businesses and management to achieve their workplace health and safety objectives, yet their distinctions are often blurred.

This blog aims to shed light on the fundamental disparities between safety audits and inspections. By understanding their unique roles and methodologies, organisations can strengthen their commitment to a secure work environment, proactively addressing risks and fostering a robust culture of safety.

What Is The Difference?

Safety inspections and safety audits differ primarily in their duration and scope. The Oxford English Dictionary defines a ‘Safety Audit’ as “an assessment of a building or other physical structure with regard to its safety.” (Mishra, 2024). Safety audits, which are more thorough, occur less frequently than inspections. Typically conducted annually, safety audits can take several days to weeks to complete, particularly for larger businesses (Ease, 2020).

Conversely, safety inspections are conducted more regularly and require less time to perform. A safety inspection is considered to be a formal process for identifying potential hazards that could harm workers or the public (Mishra, 2018).  The inspection procedure will depend on the specifics of the environment being assessed. Broadly speaking, it will involve comparing observations of the working environment, equipment, and worker behaviour against a set of standards to ensure that all fall within acceptable safety limits. Most inspections involve a checklist to ensure that the assessment is thorough, and all likely hazards have been considered.

Purpose of Workplace Inspections

Workplace health and safety inspections are a useful tool to help prevent risk.

When you carry out a workplace inspection, you are critically examining the workplace to identify and report potential hazards that can be removed or avoided. Workplace inspection should be supported by other measures to prevent risk. This includes consulting with workers, especially when changes are being proposed to a process, procedure, or plant.

When to Schedule an Inspection

It is important to schedule regular workplace inspections. This recognises that workplace hazards come in many forms and need to be managed in a proactive way.

You may also need to carry out an inspection:

• In response to a report of an incident or hazard; or
• When a new process, procedure or plant is introduced to a workplace.

How to Carry Out an Inspection

An inspection checklist should be tailored to the specific hazards of your workplace.

The checklist should be developed in consultation with work group representatives. This includes health and safety representatives (HSRs), managers, workers, and other interested people.

• The checklist considers the:
  • Environment, including noise, vibration, lighting, temperature, and ventilation.
  • Equipment, including tools and materials.
  • Work processes including how the worker interacts with elements while carrying out a task or operation.
• Things to consider when conducting a workplace inspection:
  • Listen to the concerns of workers and their representatives.
  • Review and analyse workplace hazards and incident reporting data.
  • Identify existing and potential hazards and determine their underlying cause. Review how effective hazard controls that were previously implemented were.
  • Identify areas which need special attention due to the nature of work carried out.
  • Identify areas which need attention where data shows signs of stress, wear, impact, vibration, heat, corrosion, chemical reaction or misuse.
  • The entire workplace area should be included in the inspection. This includes parking lots, building access, rest areas, storage and amenities (Comcare, 2022).

Purpose of the Safety Audit

Safety audits are considered the gold standard for evaluating the effectiveness of Workplace health and safety programs. The primary purpose of conducting a Safety Audit is to identify the health and safety hazards present, assess the effectiveness of the controls in place for these hazards, and ensure compliance with the nationally recognised Australian Standards. These audits are generally conducted by independent third-party auditors and consultants to ensure the review of the companies’ policies, procedures, and safety management systems remains unbiased.

• Safety Audits have 3 primary objectives:
  1. Determine if the company is following its safety system.
  2. Identify weaknesses and gaps within the safety system.
  3. Ensure proper recording-keeping processes are maintained (Ease, 2020).

At the End of the Audit

After the audit, the feedback and report may contain several findings that require action. These may be classified according to their significance. For example, in the ISO systems, the feedback is prioritized as follow:

• Major non-conformance – a significant issue or breach which requires urgent action. This could result in the failure of the safety management system and/or result in injury. In ISO terms, a major non-conformance would be grounds for refusing certification.
• Minor non-conformance – an issue that is less serious and unlikely to result in injury or a system breakdown. In ISO terms, a minor non-conformance would require corrective action, but the certification would be granted.
• Observations – an auditor’s opinion that the organisation could decide to act on.

Key Differences Between Audits & Inspections

Audit	Workplace Inspection
Detailed planning is required; it requires considerable resources.	Only limited planning and main resource required is the inspectors’ time.
A long process that examines the entire management system.	A relatively short process looking at practices in part of the workplace.
Assesses the effectiveness of control measures.	Identify new hazards that require implementation of controls.
It is based mainly on the review of documentary evidence, observations, and interviews with all levels of personnel.	Primarily based on observations, perhaps involving very limited scrutiny of paperwork and interview of operators.
Long, comprehensive report that records areas of concern and weaknesses in the management system.	Short report identifying key corrective actions required.
Aims to improve systems at a high level, with the ultimate effect of improvements cascading down to the operating level. Is a strategic tool addressing long-term progress	Focuses on activities and equipment at an operational level, though remedial actions may address system faults.
Typically done annually.	Usually done on a daily, weekly, monthly, or quarterly frequency.

Blog source: (Ali, 2023)

Seeking Audit or Inspection Support For Your Workplace?

At Bramwell Partners, our WHS Consultants can guide you through the process and ensure you achieve excellence in your workplace health and safety management system and safety standards.

If you are interested in improving your business safety management system or for inspection and audit guidance, contact our WHS Brisbane team for a free consultation on (07) 3630 5695 or our Central Queensland team on (07) 4849 5517. Alternatively, you can email success@bramwellpartners.com.au and we will get back to you as soon as possible.

References

Ali, W. (2023) ‘15 Main Differences Between Audit And Inspection’, HSE Blogs. Occupational Health and Safety Blog, 13 July. Available at: https://www.hseblog.com/difference-between-an-audit-and-inspection/ (Accessed: 13 May 2024).

Comcare (2022) Conduct workplace inspections, Comcare. Available at: https://www.comcare.gov.au/safe-healthy-work/prevent-harm/workplace-inspections (Accessed: 13 May 2024).

Ease (2020) ‘Safety Audit vs. Safety Inspection: What’s the Difference?’, Ease. Ease, Inc, 10 December. Available at: https://www.ease.io/blog/safety-audit-vs-safety-inspection-whats-the-difference/ (Accessed: 13 May 2024).

Mishra, T. (2018) Safety inspection, Safeopedia. Available at: https://www.safeopedia.com/definition/490/safety-inspection (Accessed: 13 May 2024).

Mishra, T. (2024) Safety audit, Safeopedia. Available at: https://www.safeopedia.com/definition/486/safety-audit (Accessed: 13 May 2024).