Evaluation & Corrective Action

The audit team, through its systematic analysis, should document areas that require corrective action, as well as where the process safety management system is effective. This provides a record of the audit procedures and findings, and serves as a baseline of operation data for future audits. It will assist in determining changes or trends in future audits.

Corrective action is one of the most important parts of the audit and includes identifying deficiencies and planning, following-up, and documenting the corrections. The corrective action process normally begins with a management review of the audit findings. The purpose of this review is to determine what actions are appropriate and to establish priorities, timetables, resource allocations and requirements, and responsibilities. In some cases, corrective action may involve a simple change in procedures or a minor maintenance effort to remedy the problem. Management of change procedures needs to be used, as appropriate, even for a seemingly minor change. Many of the deficiencies can be acted on promptly, while some may require engineering studies or more detailed review of actual procedures and practices. There may be instances where no action is necessary; this is a valid response to an audit finding. All actions taken, including an explanation when no action is taken on a finding, need to be documented.

The employer must ensure that the following are addressed:

• Each deficiency that was identified is addressed.
• The corrective action to be taken is noted.
• The responsible audit person or team is properly documented.

To control the corrective action process, the employer should consider the use of a tracking system. This tracking system might include the following:

• Periodic status reports that are shared with the affected levels of management
• Specific reports, such as a report that documents the completion of an engineering study
• A final implementation report

This type of tracking system provides the employer with the status of each corrective action. It also provides the documentation required to verify that appropriate corrective actions were taken on deficiencies identified in the audit.

To learn more about Process Safety Management visit our Cal/OSHA Process Safety Management Online Training web page.