PUWER or LOLER: Which One Applies to Your Lift?

By Nutan Mandal, ElevatorPlus · Published 13 August · Last updated 13 August · ~9 min read · Compliance reviewed by Mr. Sumeet Katariya

In short: PUWER and LOLER both apply to a workplace passenger lift at the same time. PUWER regulation 5 requires the lift to be maintained. LOLER regulation 9 requires it to be thoroughly examined, on a stated interval, by someone independent of the maintenance. Neither duty discharges the other. This guide separates them, gives the intervals from the regulation itself, and explains why the PUWER inspection duty is switched off for lifts.

Key takeaways

• PUWER regulation 5 is short and absolute. "Every employer shall ensure that work equipment is maintained in an efficient state, in efficient working order and in good repair." No interval. No prescribed method. No report to anyone.
• LOLER regulation 9(3) is where the intervals live. At least every 6 months for lifting equipment used for lifting persons. At least every 12 months for other lifting equipment. Or in accordance with an examination scheme.
• PUWER's own inspection duty does not apply to lifts. Regulation 6(5)(c) excludes "work equipment for lifting loads including persons". LOLER regulation 9 takes its place. Very little published guidance says this out loud.
• The examiner should not be the maintenance engineer. HSE's stated position is that the competent person should not be the person who undertakes routine maintenance, because they would then be assessing their own work.
• Enforcement is split by premises, not by equipment. HSE covers factories, hospitals and schools. Local authorities cover offices, shops, hotels, restaurants and leisure premises. Same regulations, different inspector.

What this guide covers: the exact wording of PUWER regulation 5 · what LOLER regulation 9 requires and when · why PUWER inspection is switched off for lifts · the competent-person separation · lifts that fall outside both sets of regulations · who enforces · what the paperwork has to survive · FAQs.

Two duties, one lift

A passenger lift in a workplace is work equipment. It is also lifting equipment. That is not a drafting curiosity. It means two sets of regulations apply to the same machine at the same time, and they ask for different things.

PUWER is the general duty. Regulation 5 reads in full:

5.—(1) Every employer shall ensure that work equipment is maintained in an efficient state, in efficient working order and in good repair.

(2) Every employer shall ensure that where any machinery has a maintenance log, the log is kept up to date.

That is the entire regulation. Forty-odd words. It names no interval, no method, no qualification and no report. The duty is about condition. The lift works, it is in good repair, and it is kept that way.

LOLER then sits on top. It does not replace PUWER. HSE's own framing is that LOLER "builds on" the requirements of PUWER. Regulation 9 is prescriptive in exactly the ways regulation 5 is not.

That gap is the whole point. One duty is continuous and unmeasured. The other is periodic, independent and evidenced.

What regulation 9 actually requires

Regulation 9(3)(a) gives three routes, and they are alternatives to each other, not to maintenance.

Thorough examination "at least every 6 months" for lifting equipment for lifting persons or an accessory for lifting. "At least every 12 months" for other lifting equipment. Or, in either case, "in accordance with an examination scheme".

So a passenger lift is six-monthly. A goods-only lift that carries no person is twelve-monthly. A lift under a written examination scheme drawn up by a competent person follows that scheme instead, and the scheme has to identify the parts to be examined, the methods, and the intervals.

The scheme route is the one most often misused. It is not a way to relax the interval by preference. HSE's guidance is that where an examination scheme exists it should be possible to produce a written copy on request, and that it should be secured from loss or unauthorised modification.

Two further limbs of regulation 9 get skipped in practice. Regulation 9(2) requires thorough examination after installation and before first use, and again after assembly at a new site. Regulation 9(3)(a)(iv) requires one "each time that exceptional circumstances which are liable to jeopardise the safety of the lifting equipment have occurred". Damage, long periods out of use and replacement of critical parts all sit in that category.

The bit almost nobody cites: PUWER regulation 6 is switched off

PUWER has its own inspection duty at regulation 6. It requires inspection after installation, at suitable intervals, and after exceptional circumstances. It reads a great deal like LOLER regulation 9.

It does not apply to lifts.

Regulation 6(5)(c) excludes "work equipment for lifting loads including persons" from the whole of regulation 6. The drafters removed the general inspection duty from lifting equipment precisely because LOLER regulation 9 was going to cover it.

This matters for two reasons. It explains why the six-monthly figure never appears anywhere in PUWER, which is where a surprising number of people go looking for it. And it makes the parallel structure explicit. PUWER keeps maintenance. LOLER takes examination. Nothing overlaps.

What survives from PUWER for a lift is regulation 5. Maintenance, and the maintenance log if the machine has one.

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Why the maintenance engineer cannot sign the examination

The term "competent person" is not defined in LOLER. It is defined in the Approved Code of Practice, L113, at paragraph 296: someone with such appropriate practical and theoretical knowledge and experience of the lifting equipment as will enable them to detect defects or weaknesses and to assess their importance in relation to the safety and continued use of the equipment.

HSE then adds a separation point. The competent person may be employed by the same organisation, provided they are sufficiently independent and impartial that in-house examinations are made without fear or favour. But it should not be the same person who undertakes routine maintenance, because they would then be responsible for assessing their own maintenance work.

That single line disposes of the most common arrangement in the market. A maintenance contract with a six-monthly "service and inspection" visit by the same engineer is not a thorough examination under regulation 9, however thorough the engineer.

The confusion is not confined to small firms. It shows up in service documentation, in tender responses and in renewal quotes, including some of ours before we checked it properly.

The status of L113, and what the standards actually do

L113 is Safe use of lifting equipment: Lifting Operations and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998. Approved Code of Practice and guidance, second edition, December 2014, with a 2018 amendment to paragraph 28(c) on high-lift pallet trucks.

It is not the regulation. It is not optional either.

HSE's stated legal status for an ACOP: it gives practical advice on how to comply, and if you follow it you will be doing enough to comply in respect of the matters it covers. You may use alternative methods. But the Code has a special legal status. If you are prosecuted for breach of health and safety law and it is proved that you did not follow the relevant provisions of the Code, you will need to show that you complied with the law in some other way, or a court will find you at fault.

The British Standards do something different again, and neither of them is a legal duty.

BS EN 81-20:2020, Safety rules for the construction and installation of lifts. Lifts for the transport of persons and goods. Passenger and goods passenger lifts, published 30 April 2020. It governs the design and construction of new lifts. It is not a maintenance or examination standard.

BS 7255:2023, Safe working on lifts. Code of practice, published 30 November 2023, superseding BS 7255:2012. It gives recommendations for safe working practices for people working on lifts, including car-top and pit procedures for lifts built to BS EN 81-20, removal of an unsafe lift from service, and training and competence.

So BS EN 81-20 is about the lift. BS 7255 is about the person standing on top of it. Neither one sets an examination interval. Regulation 9 does that.

Which lifts sit outside both

Not every lift in a building is caught.

HSE's position is that lifting equipment which is not provided for, or used by, people at work will in most cases fall outside both LOLER and PUWER. The examples given are stair lifts in private dwellings and platform lifts in shops used for customer access.

That is not the end of the duty. Where the lift is operated by, or to some extent under the control of, an employer or self-employed person in connection with their business, section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 still imposes general responsibilities towards people who are not employees, so far as is reasonably practicable. HSE's own comment is that because the risks may be the same, a similar regime of maintenance, inspection and examination may be entirely reasonably practicable.

Escalators and moving walkways are a separate case again. LOLER does not apply to them at all, even though they move people between levels. They fall under regulation 19 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992. Industry guidance prepared by the Safety Assessment Federation in consultation with HSE recommends thorough examination normally at six-monthly intervals, but that is a recommendation, not regulation 9.

Who turns up, and what has to still exist when they do

Enforcement follows the premises, not the machine.

HSE enforces in factories, farms, building sites, mines, schools and colleges, hospitals and nursing homes, and central and local government premises. Local authority environmental health enforces in offices other than government offices, shops, hotels, restaurants, leisure premises, pubs and clubs, nurseries, and privately owned museums.

The same lift, the same regulation 9, a different inspector depending on what the building is used for. A managing agent running a mixed portfolio will be answerable to both.

Retention is set by LOLER regulation 11(2). For a routine regulation 9(3) thorough examination, the information in the report must be kept available for inspection until the next report is made under that paragraph, or for two years, whichever is later. Reports from a regulation 9(1) first-use examination are kept until the employer ceases to use the equipment. Reports from a regulation 9(2) installation examination are kept until the equipment stops being used at the place it was installed. Declarations of conformity are kept for as long as the equipment is operated.

The reports themselves have no prescribed form. LOLER Schedule 1 lists 11 items that must appear. Beyond that, format is open.

Frequently asked questions

Does a six-monthly maintenance visit satisfy LOLER regulation 9?

No. Maintenance is PUWER regulation 5. Thorough examination is LOLER regulation 9. They are separate duties on the same lift, and HSE's guidance is that the person carrying out the thorough examination should not be the person who undertakes routine maintenance.

How often must a passenger lift be thoroughly examined?

At least every 6 months under regulation 9(3)(a)(i), because it is lifting equipment for lifting persons. A goods-only lift that carries no person falls under regulation 9(3)(a)(ii), at least every 12 months. Either can instead follow an examination scheme drawn up by a competent person.

Where does PUWER state the six-monthly interval?

It does not. PUWER contains no interval for lifts at all. Its inspection duty at regulation 6 is expressly disapplied to lifting equipment by regulation 6(5)(c). The intervals come from LOLER regulation 9(3).

Can an in-house engineer be the competent person?

The ACOP allows it, provided they are sufficiently independent and impartial that the examination is made without fear or favour. HSE adds that it should not be the same person who carries out the routine maintenance on that equipment.

Is L113 legally binding?

It is an Approved Code of Practice, not a regulation. It has special legal status. If you are prosecuted and it is proved you did not follow the relevant provisions, you must show you complied with the law in some other way, or a court will find you at fault.

Does LOLER apply to escalators?

No. HSE states that LOLER does not apply to escalators or moving walkways. They are covered by regulation 19 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992. Industry guidance produced with HSE recommends six-monthly thorough examination, but this is guidance rather than a regulation 9 duty.

Who enforces LOLER on a lift in an office block?

The local authority environmental health department, not HSE. Offices other than government offices, shops, hotels, restaurants and leisure premises are local authority enforced. HSE covers factories, schools, hospitals and similar premises.

How long must a thorough examination report be kept?

For a routine six-monthly or twelve-monthly examination under regulation 9(3), until the next such report is made or two years, whichever is later. Reports from the first-use examination under regulation 9(1) are kept until the employer stops using the equipment.

The bottom line

The two duties were drafted to run in parallel, and the drafters went to the trouble of switching PUWER's inspection duty off so they would not collide. Maintenance under regulation 5 keeps the lift in good repair. Examination under regulation 9 is the independent check that the maintenance worked.

A contractor who treats the second as a by-product of the first has not read either regulation. When an inspector arrives, the question is rarely whether the lift was serviced. It is whether the examination report exists, whether the person who signed it was independent of the servicing, and whether the previous one is still retrievable.

Most of the failures are not engineering failures. They are records that were never separated in the first place.

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Related reading

• Lift maintenance software built for UK lift companies
• LOLER and Passenger Lifts in the UK: What Owners and Contractors Must Get Right
• Elevator Maintenance Software UK 2026: What to Look For
• The Complete Lift Maintenance Checklist for 2026

About the author. Nutan Mandal writes on lift regulation and compliance for ElevatorPlus, the Elevator Business Operating System used by 200+ elevator companies across 20+ countries. Compliance reviewed by Mr. Sumeet Katariya.

Sources: PUWER 1998 regulation 5, Maintenance · PUWER 1998 regulation 6, Inspection · LOLER 1998 regulation 9, Thorough examination and inspection · LOLER 1998 regulation 11, Keeping of information · HSE, Thorough examinations and inspections of lifting equipment · HSE, Passenger lifts and escalators · HSE, L113 Safe use of lifting equipment ACOP and guidance · HSE, Legal status of HSE guidance and ACOPs · HSE, Is HSE the correct enforcing authority for you? · BSI, BS 7255:2023 Safe working on lifts. Code of practice · BSI, BS EN 81-20:2020

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