Health and safety risk assessment
Assess the undertaking, not an imaginary average block.
The duty depends on who is conducting the work activity, who may be affected and which risks arise. A generic annual building checklist cannot answer those questions by itself.
Set the duty
Name the organisation, activity and people affected.
Risks to employees
An employer must make a suitable and sufficient assessment of risks to employees arising from work.
Risks to residents, visitors and contractors
The assessment must also cover people not employed by the organisation who may be affected by its undertaking.
Relevant work activities
A self-employed person may have assessment duties where their undertaking presents risks within the current statutory test.
Owner, RMC, RTM company and agent
Do not assign the duty by job title alone. Use the company, contracts, control of the premises and actual work arrangements to establish responsibilities and cooperation.
Make it usable
A risk register should drive work, not merely prove a visit happened.
Describe the activity and location
Waste handling, contractor access, cleaning, grounds work, plant rooms and roof access present different hazards and control routes.
Identify who may be harmed and how
Include employees, residents, visitors, contractors and people who may need particular consideration. Avoid a generic 'all persons' label where the exposure differs.
Record existing and further controls
Show what already reduces the risk, what remains, who owns the action and what evidence will close it.
Record significant findings when required
Where an employer has five or more employees, significant findings and groups especially at risk must be recorded. A written record can still be useful below that threshold.
Review against change and validity
There is no universal annual assessment interval in regulation 3. Review when there is reason to suspect it is no longer valid, after a significant change, and often enough to keep controls effective.
Keep specific regimes separate
One risk assessment does not replace the specialist records.
Fire risk assessment
Use the Fire Safety Order route for common parts, evacuation and general fire precautions.
Asbestos management
Use the Control of Asbestos Regulations for the common-parts duty, register, management plan and work classification.
Installation-specific duties
Identify the appliance or electrical system, premises, duty-holder and competent inspection evidence under the applicable regime.
Other hazards have their own controls
Do not infer lift, legionella or work-equipment compliance from one general block inspection. Connect each specialist assessment and action record.
Sources for this page
Open the law and guidance yourself.
The risk-assessment duty, recording threshold and statutory review triggers.
↗HSE guidanceManaging risks and risk assessment at workHSE's current practical route for identifying hazards, assessing risk, controlling it and recording findings.
↗Primary lawHealth and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, section 3The general duty of employers and self-employed persons to people other than employees affected by their undertaking.
↗HSE leadershipLegal responsibilities of organisationsOfficial overview of risk assessment, arrangements, competent advice and the limited circumstances in which individual officers may be prosecuted.
↗Links and current-law position checked 18 August 2026. Apply the governing documents, building facts and current law to the case in front of you.
Take the next step in LEASE-iQ
What does the lease allocate, and what belongs to safety law?
Use this for access, repair, cost recovery and document responsibility, not for a safety verdict.
Keep checking: LEASE-iQ cannot assess physical safety or professional competence. Use it to find the document route and make the safety evidence gap visible.
