A health and safety audit asks whether your arrangements actually work, which is a different question from whether the site looks right this morning. An inspection is a snapshot of conditions; an audit follows the system: are the assessments current, were people briefed, were the findings acted on, and can you show it. That is why audits are uncomfortable and useful in the same measure, and why the findings are nearly always about records rather than about hazards.
Audit against the system, inspect against the site
The auditor reads the policy, samples the risk assessments and method statements, checks the training and competence records, follows a few incidents from report to closure, and then walks the site to see whether what is written is what happens. A gap between the two is the finding, in either direction.
The four findings small firms see most
Assessments that are generic rather than specific to the job. Briefings that happened and were not recorded. Actions raised with no owner or date. And inspection or maintenance records for plant and equipment that cannot be produced on request. None is about anybody being unsafe on the day; all four are about whether it could be shown.
Prepare by fixing the record, not the site
The week before an audit is better spent making sure the assessments are current and the briefing register is complete than on housekeeping. Housekeeping is an inspection finding that is fixed in an hour; a missing year of briefing records cannot be fixed at all.
Questions people ask about health and safety audit
Who carries out the audit?
Either your own competent person, a consultant, a principal contractor auditing its supply chain, or a certification body where you hold a management system standard. The rigour differs; the questions do not.
How often should a small firm audit itself?
Annually as a full pass, with lighter checks through the year on the parts that change most: assessments, briefings and training. The point is to find the gap before somebody else does.
What is the difference between an audit and an inspection?
An inspection looks at conditions now and is frequent. An audit looks at whether the system that produces those conditions is working, and is occasional. A firm that inspects weekly and never audits usually has tidy sites and thin records.