Activity Feed › Discussion Forums › Strictly Surveying › Safety Program
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andrewm, post: 409940, member: 10888 wrote: .. and we have spent $$$$ having to become a member of ISNetworld. It’s an online contractor vetting process. Most of the industries in our area are moving towards that for complete contractor vetting, from insurance to a full blown safety plan that complies with the site’s specific requirements…
I was “forced” to comply with ISN to maintain my contracts. It was nothing but a shakedown. My client hired ISN to audit all of their subcontractors’ safety plans and then (for thousands of dollars) ISN offered their “services” to the subcontractors to help meet their own approved standards. It was like hiring a fox to watch the hen-house.
It took a year but I was finally able to obtain approval without paying for it. I wrote contract specifications for a few years and felt I could come up with a pretty durable safety program. One of the biggest hurdles was trying to convince a computer that even though I subcontracted from a power utility provider, my employees did not need to go to pole-climbing school. And our company vehicle insurance was rejected several times because of failure to provide the proper policy that covered high-voltage line trucks and equipment. It would have been a little easier if I could have talked to a human at ISN (all their reviews were on-line) that did not have an Eastern Indian accent.
It’s over now, I’ve sold my share of the company. Let someone else deal with it.
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Being a one man show, do you carry workmans comp? That might be the next thing that they ask for.
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paden cash, post: 409945, member: 20 wrote: I was “forced” to comply with ISN to maintain my contracts. It was nothing but a shakedown. My client hired ISN to audit all of their subcontractors’ safety plans and then (for thousands of dollars) ISN offered their “services” to the subcontractors to help meet their own approved standards. It was like hiring a fox to watch the hen-house.
Without turning this into a ISN bashing thread I agree on the shakedown assessment. We also produced our own safety program but the hours involved to keep our B rating is something I really don’t want to look at.
We provide our one man crews with a SPOT GPS when working in remote areas. -
Wow… I am glad I’m not the only one that wants to bash ISN! I have successfully refused to be a victim to this scam. But my time is limited, I am sure.
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We have to comply with ISN, Veriforce, and I don’t know what all else. Safety is a VP level position here.
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paden cash, post: 409904, member: 20 wrote: I just had to jump in and put the “toilet bowl” remark in there…;)
That was fabulous!!!
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andrewm, post: 409940, member: 10888 wrote: Consider yourself lucky. We are a very small company (4 full time employees including the office manager plus one part time) and we have spent $$$$ having to become a member of ISNetworld. It’s an online contractor vetting process. Most of the industries in our area are moving towards that for complete contractor vetting, from insurance to a full blown safety plan that complies with the site’s specific requirements. We had to hire a safety consultant to help us write a safety plan that was compliant. The problem with those huge safety plans is that it says that you are doing a whole lot of things safety-wise. So you have to develop a checklist of things the plan says you are doing to make sure it gets done. Like monthly safety meetings, etc. It has made us analyze every component of our field operations for actual risk to our employees. Although costly and a huge pain in the rear, it’s probably not a bad thing.
If you ever end up working for industry, a good safety plan is a must. So even though you are a one-man show, it would be wise to develop something that addresses everything you could possibly encounter from a safety perspective and what steps you are doing to eliminate or minimize risk including PPE requirements. As applicable to your work, it should address environmental (cold, heat), wildlife (poisonous insects, snakes, alligators, etc), utilities (overhead power lines, transformers, buried utilities, etc.), hazardous chemicals, confined spaces, power tools, ladders and scaffolding, vehicular traffic, falling objects, driving (including trailer hookup and towing). For just one person, make of those topics would either be NA or very short discussions. A lot of this seems like common sense, but it still needs to be included in your plan.
Becoming a member of ISNetworld is the reason why I’m having to put a formal safety program together
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I read about a year ago that sole proprietors don’t have to comply with OSHA. Not sure the truth to it but if so OSHA shouldn’t be able to fine you if they come to a site your on.
I don’t keep any of that gear. Once in a blue moon I do a job and show up and they try to stuff a hard hat on me or make me come with steel tip boots…
Last time I had shorts on, ‘improper’ work boots, short sleeves. They stuffed a helmet and vest on me. Then another group showed up (union guys) and the head honcho started taking pics of me with his cell phone. What a dope. That job was a real winner. 2 construction crews on 1 job. A union crew and a non union crew. And they wouldn’t talk to each other, they just kept to their sides and tried to figure the same problems out on their own. MTA Railroad. Go figure.
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One of my clients required 100% safety gear anytime we were working within the R/W of their aerial transmission. One (very young) project manager had some questions and I invited him to “drop by” and we could talk on site. I reminded him of the safety gear requirements. This was also the second week of August last year. And that is no time of year to be wearing all that fire retardant crap.
After we had walked a hot and steamy half mile we came upon a property owner feeding his cattle. The property owner wanted to know why we “were all decked out”…I told him because there’s a little book somewhere that says we’re suppose to.
We finally made the whole mile to my waiting vehicle..and water. The project manager agreed we could dispense with most of the safety gear when we were on private property (easement only). We still had to wear all that crap while on the sub-stations property.
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Just found out this morning that yet another of our clients has come out with a 100% FRC requirement regardless of where you are or what you’re doing. What has happened to common sense?? I’m a lot more worried about heat exhaustion wearing FRC in Louisiana in the summer than I am about whatever it’s supposedly protecting me from in a ROW.
It’s getting to the point where the crews have to spend half of their time on site cooling down and hydrating.
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Lee D, post: 410479, member: 7971 wrote: Just found out this morning that yet another of our clients has come out with a 100% FRC requirement regardless of where you are or what you’re doing.
Do you really want them as a client?
There are a number of organisations like that we no longer do work for – its just not worth the hassle
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It’s the nature of working in oil & gas… yes, we definitely still want them as a client. Unfortunately these safety rules just keep getting crazier though.
On the bright side, we’re at something like 2.6 million man hours without an OSHA recordable. I appreciate safety and enjoy working for a company that takes it seriously. I just think that wearing FRC to cut line for a proposed ROW is a little over the top.
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Reminds me of a project I did in Montana several years ago. I was doing shoreline assessments from a pipeline spill on the Yellowstone River. It was in July so the air temp was in the 90s, but the water temp was in the 40s. The genius safety guy had us wear full body mustang suits in the boat in case we fell overboard. The river was raging at flood stage. That was fine for the trip to the survey location. But after we had been hacking our way through thick brush for several hours, putting that suit back on for the ride back was not a good idea. All of us almost passed out from heat exhaustion. After I met with the safety guy when I got back that day, no more mustang suits…
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Lee D, post: 410479, member: 7971 wrote: What has happened to common sense??
Good question. How about having to wear a hard hat on the taxiway of an international airport? If something was to fall out of the sky, I think a hard hat would be very little protection. Somehow it seems that safety programs are more about reducing liability than actually protecting the worker.
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lmbrls, post: 410629, member: 6823 wrote: Somehow it seems that safety programs are more about reducing liability than actually protecting the worker.
True, so very very true…
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Once upon a time (like all good fairy tales start out) we had a client who had a safety program in place that put ATV’s on the absolutely forbidden list. Our job was at the most remote portion of their several thousand acre tract and over a half mile from where any employee would ever be working. I had a nice chat with the two adjoining property owners. Most of what we were doing was defining those common boundary lines so they both agreed to let us do anything we needed from their side. We had based our contractual amount for the job on doing a tremendous amount of walking and packing everything in and out for substantial distances. By working from the neighbor’s side we were done in about one-fifth the effort. I didn’t feel the least bit guilty for charging the full amount. Stupid people need to suffer for their own stupidity sometimes.
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