Will your permit system hold when pressure increases?
Most permit systems look robust on paper. An independent review shows you how yours behaves in practice, before an incident does.
The initial conversation is at no cost and carries no obligation.
The problem is rarely the procedure. It is what happens under pressure.
Serious incidents continue to occur in organisations with well-documented permit procedures.
In most cases the issue is not the design of the system, but how it behaves when real operational pressure enters the process. Routine work, simultaneous activities, contractor involvement, and plant restart can erode the controls that permits are meant to enforce.
Internal audits and inspections tend to examine whether systems are documented. An independent review starts from a different question: how does the system actually behave during day-to-day operations, and will it keep performing as the pace and complexity of work increases?
Examine whether the system is documented.
Examines whether the system holds up under operational pressure.
What the review examines
How the permit system operates in practice, not solely what the documentation says.
Permit Issuing Behaviour
How scope is defined, how hazards are identified and controls selected, whether issuers challenge what they are asked to authorise, and how conditions reach performing authorities.
Isolation and Energy Control
How permits interact with lockout tagout, how isolations are verified before work, who confirms safe conditions, and where assumptions about stored energy go unexamined.
ALARP Decision-Making
How ALARP assessments are applied when minimum isolation standards cannot be met, whether decisions are documented, and whether issuers engage with the process or defer without structured assessment.
Coordination of Work
Visibility of active permits across site, how boards or digital systems support coordination, and how simultaneous operations are identified and managed.
Permit Lifecycle Control
Validity and extension practices, supervision during work, shift handover quality, and how suspension and closure are handled when pressure increases.
Restart and Reinstatement
How isolation removal is controlled, how restart is coordinated, what communication happens before re-energisation, and how supervision is managed on return to service.
The objective is to find where the system appears compliant while still containing the conditions for operational failure.
How the review works
A focused snapshot designed to find system pressure points, not a full compliance audit. Everything is done remotely, so there is no site visit and minimal disruption to operations.
Document Review
You share your permit procedures, isolation arrangements and safety documentation. They are examined to understand what the system demands of the people operating it, not just whether procedures exist.
Permit Sample Review
You send a sample of recent permits. They are examined for work scope clarity, hazard identification and control selection as they are actually completed.
Operational Discussions
Structured video calls with the people who issue, supervise and perform permitted work, covering routine operations, shutdowns and high workload.
Typical timeline: a scoping call, then about a week for you to gather documents and permits, discussions in the following days, and the written summary within roughly five working days of the last call. Timings flex with the size of the site and how quickly information arrives.
What you receive
A short, structured review summary. Not a stack of new procedures. It highlights where your existing system may weaken in the conditions that matter most, with practical improvement opportunities based on what was observed.
Operational patterns affecting permit control
What was observed in how the system is used day to day.
Potential failure points under pressure
Where controls are most likely to weaken as workload rises.
Coordination risks between concurrent work
Where simultaneous activities can interact unseen.
Practical improvement opportunities
Specific, proportionate actions based on what was observed.
Reviewed by someone who has issued the permits
Reviews are led by an HSE specialist with around ten years of direct operational experience issuing permits across pharmaceutical manufacturing and process environments. That means the view comes from the issuer’s chair, where schedule pressure, isolation compromises and handover gaps are lived experience rather than theory.
- Permit-to-work issuing in high-hazard industrial settings
- Lockout tagout and energy isolation
- Confined space entry
- Simultaneous operations (SIMOPS)
- Contractor management and supervision
- Shift handover and plant restart
When organisations request a review
Usually because something has prompted doubt about how the system is actually performing.
- Permit deviations or near misses with no obvious cause
- Doubt over consistency of isolation and LOTO verification
- Preparing for a regulatory inspection
- A major shutdown
- Changes to permit issuing responsibilities
- Introducing a digital permit system
Shutdowns, role changes and digital rollouts do not create new problems. They compress activity and expose weaknesses that were already there.
Most organisations that request a review are not in crisis. They want a clear answer to a question their internal processes cannot objectively answer for them.
Not ready for a review? Start here.
Free tools and guidance from the same team, to help you see where your system stands first.
PermitToWorkGuide
Practical guidance on permit-to-work systems for high-hazard operations, including isolation, ALARP, shift handover and contractor management.
Visit PermitToWorkGuideWarehouse Safety Guide
Practical guidance and tools on warehouse safety, from inspection standards to audit programmes and incident reduction.
Visit Warehouse Safety GuideFind out before an incident does.
Reviews are scoped individually and priced accordingly. The first conversation covers what you want to understand and whether a review is the right fit, at no cost and with no obligation.