BS OHSAS 18001

What it is


The BS OHSAS 18001 standard (where OHSAS stands for Occupational Health and Safety Assessment Series) specifies the requirements for an Occupational Health and Safety Management System (OHSMS) to enable an Organization to control its OHS risks and to improve its performance.
The OHSAS 18001 standard is applicable to any organization that wants:
  • establish an OHSMS to eliminate or minimize the risks for workers and other stakeholders who may be exposed to OHS hazards associated with their activities;
  • continuously implement, maintain and improve an OHSMS;
  • safeguard its compliance with its established OHS policy;
  • demonstrate the compliance of its OHSMS with the OHSAS standard:
    • producing a self-declaration and ensuring self-determination, or
    • requiring confirmation of its compliance by parties who have an interest in the OHSMS, such as customers, or
    • requiring a certification or registration of its OHSMS by an external organization.
CSQA is accredited by ACCREDIA.
CSQA can issue internationally recognized certifications through IQNet, being a member of CISQ.


Key points

Occupational Health and Safety means: "Conditions and factors that affect or may affect the health and safety of employees or other workers (including temporary workers and contractor staff), visitors and any other person in the workplace (see 3.23) ".
OHSAS 18001 is an organizational tool that allows to manage the workers safety in an organic and systematic way without disturbing the organizational structure of the company, focusing on the following requirements:
  • implementation of a safety management policy;
  • identification of hazards, risk assessment and identification of control procedures, in close connection with the legislative or other provisions adopted;
  • definition of specific programs and objectives by implementing the Plan Do Check Act approach;
  • definition of tasks and responsibilities;
  • training and involvement of workers;
  • interview and communication arrangements with workers and stakeholders;
  • controlled documentation management;
  • implementation of the procedures for controlling activities related to identified relevant risks, including processes such as design and maintenance;
  • preparation of measures to detect, prevent and control possible casual events (injuries and accidents) and emergencies;
  • monitoring and measuring the system performance for health and safety, as well as for maintaining compliance with legislation;
  • definition and implementation of systematic controls (injuries, accidents, non-compliance, corrective and preventive actions) and periodic reviews of the adequacy of the management system;
  • identification and evaluation of the risks and hazards associated with third party activities at the site of the organization.


Benefits

  • Controlling and maintaining compliance with legislation and monitoring health and safety at workplaces.
  • Access the benefits in financing procedures and bureaucratic/administrative simplifications.
  • Have a tool for supporting investment decisions or technological upgrade.
  • Have a tool for safeguarding corporate assets.
  • Guaranteeing a systematic and pre-planned approach to emergencies coming from injuries and accidents.
  • Better relationship and communication with the Authorities.
  • Improving corporate image towards external and internal customers.
  • Easy to integrate with quality (ISO 9001) and environmental (ISO 14001) management systems.

Article. 30 of Legislative Decree 81/2008 contains a precise indication that "in the first application, business organization models defined in accordance with the UNI-INAIL Guidelines of 28 September 2001 for a Health and Safety Management System (OHSMS) or the British Standard OHSAS 18001: 2007 are deemed to comply with the requirements for the related parts. "
An injury is therefore an "organizational failure".

 
Does an effective management lead to economic benefits?
A 2011 research conducted by the International Social Security Association in three hundred companies from fifteen nations from all over the world highlighted how investment in prevention has economic returns on different aspects of the company and produce a cost-benefit ratio (ROP Return on prevention) of 2.2.
According to this research an investment in prevention for every worker of € 1,334, there are benefits which are 2.2 times higher (which amount to about € 2,900).