PUWER is one of those regulations that every facilities manager has heard of, but far fewer have fully got to grips with. The Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 applies to a remarkably broad range of equipment — and the documentation requirements catch many organisations off guard when an inspection happens.
This guide cuts through the legal language and explains what PUWER actually means for day-to-day facilities management.
What Equipment Does PUWER Cover?
PUWER applies to any equipment used by employees at work. “Work equipment” is defined broadly and includes:
- Machinery — including HVAC plant, boilers, compressors, and manufacturing equipment
- Hand tools — both powered and non-powered
- Lifting equipment (which also falls under LOLER)
- Vehicles used at work
- Ladders, access platforms, and similar equipment
- Kitchen equipment in commercial kitchens
- Office equipment where it presents a risk
In a typical commercial building, PUWER applies to hundreds or thousands of individual assets. That’s a significant compliance management challenge if you don’t have the right systems in place.
What Does PUWER Actually Require You to Do?
The core duties under PUWER are:
- Suitability: Equipment must be suitable for the purpose it’s used for, and for the conditions in which it operates.
- Maintenance: Equipment must be maintained in good working order. A maintenance log must be kept.
- Inspection: Equipment that poses a specific risk if it deteriorates must be inspected at suitable intervals and after exceptional circumstances (such as damage or modification). Records must be kept.
- Information and instruction: Users must be given adequate information about the equipment they use, including any risks.
- Training: Employees must be trained to use equipment safely.
- Specific risks: Guarding, temperature, markings, and other specific requirements apply depending on equipment type.
The Record-Keeping Requirement: What You Need to Have
PUWER inspections must be recorded and those records must be kept until the next inspection report is produced. The record should include:
- A description of the equipment inspected
- The date of inspection
- Details of any defects found and actions taken
- The name of the person who carried out the inspection
For facilities managers, the practical challenge is maintaining these records for every piece of in-scope equipment across a building or estate, in a way that’s retrievable when needed.
Common PUWER Failures in Facilities Management
When the HSE investigates a workplace incident involving equipment, PUWER is almost always part of the review. The failures that come up most often are:
- No maintenance log — or a log that hasn’t been updated
- Inspection overdue — equipment that should have been inspected quarterly or annually and wasn’t
- Records not linked to assets — a general maintenance log rather than equipment-specific records
- Defects recorded but not resolved — a fault noted at inspection with no follow-up action documented
PUWER and LOLER: Understanding the Overlap
Lifting equipment — passenger lifts, goods lifts, scissor lifts, hoists — falls under both PUWER and LOLER. LOLER sets additional, more specific requirements for lifting equipment including mandatory thorough examination by a competent person at defined intervals. In practice, if your building has a passenger lift, you need both a PUWER maintenance log and LOLER thorough examination certificates.
How Digital Asset Management Simplifies PUWER Compliance
The fundamental problem with PUWER compliance for facilities managers is scale. A large commercial building might have 500 pieces of in-scope equipment. Tracking inspection and maintenance schedules for all of them, and storing the records in a way that’s auditable, is genuinely difficult with spreadsheets.
Taggit is designed for exactly this environment. Each asset — from a passenger lift to a portable drill — gets a QR or NFC tag. Maintenance and inspection events are logged against the specific asset, with dates, photos, and notes. Dashboard views show which assets are overdue for inspection across your whole estate. When an inspector arrives, asset-specific records are available instantly.
PUWER compliance isn’t complicated to understand. The challenge is executing it consistently across hundreds of assets over months and years. The right system makes that manageable.
See how Taggit helps facilities teams stay PUWER compliant. Start your free trial — no credit card needed.