ISO 45001

ISO 45001 Certification is an international standard for establishing and maintaining the occupational health and safety management system (OHSMS) in your organization. The main aim of this management system is to ensure the health and wellbeing of your workforce.

The latest version of ISO 45001 Certification was published in March 2018, and the certification to ISO 45001 standard marks a significant step forward in the company’s commitment in enhancing the safety and wellbeing of the associated parties. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) publishes ISO 45001 standard that enables the organizations to take certain steps for improving the health and longevity of workforce while reducing injuries and occupational death.

ISO 45001 Certification is a revamped version of the previous standard for occupational health and safety (OHS), i.e., OHSAS 18001 certification.  For the organizations that is already certified to previous standard, transitioning to the newer one should be done within three years of publication.

The most important reason for getting certified to ISO 45001 certification is to demonstrate your commitment for a better and safer work environment. However, there are several other benefits associated with ISO 45001 certification. Following are some benefits-

• Establishment and maintenance of OHSMS in your organization and setting a framework for its continual improvement in order to minimize any the effect of any OH&S hazard.
• Conformity with the stated OH&S policy.
• Continuous upgradation of OHSMS and improvement of its performance, while preventing any accidents.
• Fulfilment of your legal obligations related to OH&S system.

In this highly competitive marketplace, an organization is required to manage risks on several fronts, and the risks associated with occupational health and safety is no exception. With ISO 45001 certification, you can demonstrate an increased safety of your employees and contractors. This greatly helps in enhancing the motivation of your workforce.

Establish controls to ensure legal compliance –With ISO 45001 Certification, you can place appropriate controls in your processes to make it compliant to the legal requirements.

Reduction of Insurance Premiums –With an effective OHSMS in place, your organization can benefit from reduced insurance premiums.

Increase Health and Safety Awareness –The ISO 45001 certification helps in building awareness among your workforce regarding the risks associated with their occupational health and safety. This ensures their involvement in an effective OHSMS.

Better Management of H&S Compliance Issues – the regulatory compliance of OHSMS is ensured through ISO 45001 certification. It thus reduces the costs as well as downtime.

Enhance your Reputation –ISO 45001 is an international certification and obtaining it immensely boosts your reputation in the market. This opens up huge business opportunities for you.

Better Manage Health and Safety Risks –by analyzing the health and safety risks, ISO 45001 certification helps in better management of such hazards.

Reduce Absenteeism –With safer work environment, your workforce are motivated. Lack of injuries also leads to lower absenteeism.

If your organization wants to demonstrate its commitment for the safety and wellbeing of employees and contractors, gaining ISO 45001 certification for your OHSMS is a wise option. The common High-Level Structure of ISO 45001, ISO 14001, and ISO 9001 ensures easy integration between different management systems. Hence, if you already have a QMS or an EMS, implementing OHSMS becomes simpler.

 Organizations that implement ISO 45001 require:

• A well-defined management structure with a thorough assignment of roles and responsibilities.
• A set objective for improvement with appropriate measurement of the progress.
• A systematic analysis of risks and its mitigation methods.

There should be a constant monitoring and measurement of OHSMS performance in order to achieve a continual improvement of your management systems.

The cost of achieving and implementing ISO 45001 Certification is dependent upon various factor, such as:

• How many working shift do you have?
• What are the industries that you deal with?
• What is the strength of your workforce?
• How complex are your processes?

The required man-days are calculated by the certifying body by thoroughly examining all these factors. Thereafter, an estimated cost is quoted.

Following are the requirements stated in the document of ISO 45001 certification. These requirements should be fulfilled in order to get awarded with ISO 45001 certification.

Section 1: Scope

Section 2: Normative-References

Section 3: Terms & Definitions

Section 4: Context of the Organization

Section 5: Leadership and Worker-Participation

Section 6: Planning

Section 7: Support

Section 8: Operation

Section 9: Performance Evaluation

Section 10: Improvement

Once you have implemented the OHSMS in your organization, it becomes necessary for you to get yourself audited in order to achieve the ISO 45001 certification. When you choose an external certification body to perform the audits, you need to first fill up the application form. Once you have reviewed all the requirements of the certification, you may plan your audits accordingly.

There are some mandatory steps to obtain ISO 45001 certification. Once the formality of documentation has been taken care of, following steps should be followed to acquire the certification:

1. Internal Audit- this is done to verify the data provided by you in the form.
2. Management Audit- the administration of your organization conducts a survey to understand the practical realities.
3. Corrective activities- After the internal and management audits, you are required to analyze and close the gaps that are observed. Make sure to archive information about the actions that were taken to fill those gaps.

The process of obtaining ISO 45001 certification comprises of two stages:

4. Stage one (documentation survey) – the reviewers from the certification body of your choice will thoroughly verify if the documentation meets prerequisites of ISO 45001 certification.
5. Stage two (Primary audit) – Here, the consistency between your documentation and the requirements of ISO 45001 certification are verified. This is done by thorough investigation of reports, records and company practices.

Injuries and hazards can occur in any work environment. A proof of resilience of your occupational health and safety management system, and an assurance to your workforce about their well-being can make your organization trustworthy in the market. This, apart from enhancing the image, helps you in gaining a lot of businesses on a global scale. As mentioned above, ISO 45001 comes with huge number of benefits.

It must be noted that the International Organization for Standardization does not certify, it just publishes the ISO standards. An external body performs the certification. Kingsmen Certification (KCS) is one such body which has a reputation for being one of the best in the world. Our vast pool of auditors is recognized for their expertise in comprehensively auditing the compliance of your management systems against the required standards and awarding you with the certifications at the end. The smoothness in the process, our integrity, and our commitment to deadlines make us stand apart from other certification bodies.