Risk factors

For construction managers and occupational health and safety inspectors, maintaining a high level of safety on a constantly changing construction site is no small challenge. The key factors influencing safety include, among others:

• experience and knowledge of workers in the field of occupational health and safety, for example: foreign workers are often unaware of the procedures and safety regulations in force in Poland, even after completing occupational health and safety training;
• number of collaborating individuals – a large number of workers does not contribute to safety, and it is difficult to maintain adequate control;
• size and complexity of the construction site – the larger the area, the more potential danger;
• construction stage and types of work – the level of risk changes depending on the construction stage, with construction work having significantly more accidents than finishing work;
• weather conditions – wind or rain do not facilitate movement around the construction site, making accidents more likely in such conditions.

Safety control

The scope and method of safety control are specified within the framework of the HSE (Health and Safety) plan. However, it does not specify how the controls will be conducted and through what tools. Therefore, the most popular tool for recording and reporting HSE incidents is a camera, a paper notepad, Microsoft Word or Excel programs, and file distribution systems such as SharePoint or Drive. There are plenty of options.

Working with these tools in the context of creating HSE reports typically involves an occupational health and safety inspector conducting inspections and identifying safety-related issues, such as a hazardous technical pit. They document the situation by taking a photo with their phone and noting their observations in a notepad or inspection sheet. After completing the inspection, they return to the office and prepare individual incident reports in Microsoft Word. They then send the file to a designated location on SharePoint or directly submit it to the construction manager via email or physically. Incident reports accumulate in the email inbox or on the construction manager’s desk.

The construction manager is often drowning in documents and struggles to respond to all incident reports. They will have to personally engage in some of these reports, while others can be delegated to employees. However, the responsibility for the safety and health of the workers will continue to rest on the construction manager.

Is that all? The inspector is obligated to prepare a comprehensive report summarizing the situation on the construction site on a weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual basis. For this purpose, they use Microsoft Excel.

Inspections are necessary, and regular work on safety is essential, but does it always have to be as tedious and burdensome as described in the case above?

Photo by Ahsanization ッ on Unsplash

New possibilities

For several years now, there has been a development of specialized applications for recording discrepancies on construction sites, and among them is the Hustro system. What does the work of an occupational health and safety inspector and a construction manager look like when using the Hustro application?

The occupational health and safety inspector conducts an inspection according to a previously prepared template. Using the mobile application, they fill out an interactive checklist. For each element/area of inspection, they can assess it as compliant, non-compliant, or not applicable, add a photo and comment, and if necessary, quickly submit a report about potentially hazardous conditions on the site.

Within the report, they can specify the person who should address the issue, such as the construction manager or another team member. After the inspection, all collected information can be downloaded in the form of a neat, automatically generated PDF report.

Creating a summary report is a formality – just select the date range and download the XLS file with all reports. It can’t get any simpler and faster. What about from the perspective of the construction manager? The manager receives real-time information about the reports via email and phone notifications. Through the phone, they can quickly delegate reports to their team members, simultaneously check the progress of work, and inform the inspector about problem resolutions.

New opportunities mean savings

Let’s examine the real benefits offered by the application. Based on statistical data gathered during collaboration with various construction companies, we can say that in building projects, inspectors create 40-50 reports per month, while in infrastructure projects, it’s between 150-200 reports per month. The preparation of one report in a ‘traditional’ way takes about 20 minutes, with the Hustro application, it can take 2 minutes. For approximate calculations, values given in ranges were averaged, and it was assumed that the hourly rate for an inspector’s work is 15 euro.

At this point, commentary seems unnecessary; the numbers speak for themselves. If we aim for a higher margin in the project, improving the team’s efficiency is a key area to address first. Introducing the right tool will take about 1-2 weeks, and the effects of the change will be visible already in the first month. Is it still worth conducting inspections in Excel and losing money?

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