Health and Safety when working abroad

Question: What steps do I need to take to maintain the duty of care to engineers that I send to work in countries with lower standards of health and safety such as China.
 
 Answer: The Company in question must always ensure that their engineers are fully covered on Employer Liability Insurance & Health Insurance for the Countries they are visiting.

Concerning working in Countries with less strict legislation, the engineers should risk assess any work they are requested to do before starting the operation. If significant risks are raised then these should be advised to the Site Owners and the Engineers Line Manager.
 
 A: First things first: Ensure that employer’s liability insurance covers the person for the transit and the work within the country and environment anticipated. Check that the insurer’s stipulations can be met.

Ideally, have a risk assessment carried out on the site before the engineers start work.
 
Train the engineer in basic risk assessments and ensure that:
 
- they have been trained in and signed for such basic things as ‘Control of hazardous energy’  – they personally check that the plug is out and cannot be put back in / the isolator is off and they have the key.
 
- That they understand access to height and know how to assess the risk and the safety equipment that they need to check is in place before hand.
 
- That they have the PPE required – ensure that they take it with them and know that they have to use it.
 
If they have a check list of this sort of item before they start work and have instructions not to work unless the measures are in place, they will start from a position of personal responsibility and are less likely to get into trouble in the first place.
 
If you require a check sheet to be done and emailed before the work starts then you can be sure that they take responsibility for their own actions and avoid taking unnecessary risks.
 

A: My advice would be to train the engineer in risk assessment so that he can do his own assessment of risk before he does a job. Just because he is another country with lower standards, everything that can be done should be done in order to ensure the duty of care is used as far as it can be and falling in line with what is “reasonably practicable
 Some useful documents: