Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998: the wider envelope every UK lift sits inside.

Suitability (Regulation 4)

The lift must be suitable for the place it is installed in, the conditions it is used in, and the people using it. For a platform lift in a care home that means a controlled descent rate, an obstruction sensor, a folding-seat option where the building's residents need it, and a control panel at wheelchair height with tactile and Braille markings. For a passenger lift in an office block it means the right capacity for peak occupancy, the right travel speed for the building height, and door-protection that has been specified for the actual footfall pattern. Suitability is a selection-stage duty as much as a maintenance one — getting the wrong lift in the first place is itself a PUWER breach.

Maintenance (Regulation 5)

Work equipment must be maintained in an efficient state, in efficient working order, and in good repair. PUWER itself does not specify a maintenance interval — that comes from the equipment manufacturer's recommendation, from the risk assessment, and on a lift, from the practical reality that a service interval of more than three months on a high-use passenger lift will leave defects accumulating between visits. BASE recommends a quarterly maintenance visit on a high-use passenger lift, six-monthly on a typical platform lift, and a maintenance log kept on the lift itself — Regulation 5 specifically requires the log to be kept up to date so that any duty-holder or competent person can verify the history at a moment's notice.

Inspection (Regulation 6)

Where the safety of the equipment depends on the installation conditions, the operating environment, or the equipment being subject to conditions likely to cause deterioration, inspection by a competent person is required at suitable intervals. On a lift the answer is yes on every count — and so a PUWER inspection is required in addition to (not instead of) the LOLER thorough examination. A PUWER inspection looks at the wider operational position: are the controls labelled, is the emergency stop reachable, is the isolation procedure documented, is the warning signage current, is the maintenance log up to date. A LOLER thorough examination looks at the lifting integrity: ropes, brakes, overspeed governor, suspension, load-bearing structure. The two are complementary, not duplicate.

Information, instructions and training (Regulations 8 and 9)

Every user, supervisor, and manager of the lift must have access to adequate health-and-safety information about it, and adequate training in how to use it safely. Information means written instructions on use, on emergency procedures, on the limits of the equipment — kept available, not buried in a facilities folder no one can find. Training means a documented session covering the controls, the emergency-stop, the evacuation procedure where a passenger needs to be released from a stalled cab, the maximum occupancy, and the response to a fault indicator. Records of who has been trained and when should be kept; refresher training is appropriate when the role changes, when the equipment changes, or after any incident.

Markings, warnings, isolation and stability (Regulations 19–24)

A lift must be marked clearly with its rated capacity (every UK lift carries a "Maximum X persons / Y kg" plate inside the cab — that is Regulation 23 in action). Warnings must be displayed where the use of the equipment carries a risk that is not obvious from the equipment itself: out-of-service signs, evacuation route maps at every landing, emergency-stop labelling on the control panel. The lift must be capable of being isolated from its sources of energy — typically a lockable isolator in the machine room, with a documented isolation procedure for engineers. The lift must be stable on its bearings and not at risk of overturning or shifting under load (Regulation 20) — relevant on platform lifts where the mast is the only structural element, on goods lifts where unbalanced loading is possible, and on hydraulic lifts where the buffer arrangement at the pit takes the load.

Lift shaft as a working environment

The lift itself is work equipment; the shaft is the environment engineers work inside. PUWER's general duties on lighting (Regulation 21), maintenance operations (Regulation 22), and markings and warnings (Regulations 23 and 24) all bear on the shaft. Adequate lighting at the headroom, at every landing, and at the pit is required — temporary inspection lamps do not meet the duty; permanent shaft-lighting circuits are the standard. Ventilation is required where engineers work in the shaft for extended periods. Safety barriers at every landing prevent objects falling into the shaft while the cab is parked elsewhere. Warning signs at every landing alert users to the lift's status (in-service, out-of-service, under-test) — the signage every property manager has seen, but few realise is itself a PUWER duty.

The LOLER overlap (and why both inspections happen in one visit)

LOLER 1998 is the lifting-specific overlay on top of PUWER. Every lift at work sits under both — PUWER for the wider operational duties, LOLER for the statutory thorough examination cycle. The competent person doing the LOLER thorough examination is the same person who is qualified to carry out the PUWER inspection, and in practice the two inspections are conducted together. The output is split into two documents — the LOLER report under Regulation 10 (statutory format, within five working days, defect-class graded) and the PUWER inspection record (no statutory format, but documented against the L22 Approved Code of Practice). The /services/inspections/puwer/ page documents how BASE delivers the PUWER inspection as part of the same visit.

Civil liability and the wider picture

Beyond the HSE enforcement route, breaches of PUWER carry civil liability. Where an employee or member of the public is injured by a lift that has not been maintained, inspected, or operated in line with PUWER, the duty-holder faces a claim from the injured party in addition to any criminal action. Insurance premiums reflect this: every public-liability and employer's-liability policy on a lifted building asks for proof of PUWER and LOLER compliance, and a missed inspection cycle is a routine reason for a renewal to be declined or loaded. The reputational cost lands somewhere between the regulatory and the commercial: HSE prosecutions are on the public register at the press.hse.gov.uk register of convictions, and increasingly come up in procurement and tenant due diligence as a hard filter.