Safety Netting and Fall Arrest Contractor Insurance

This trade carries a reliance exposure sharper than almost any other in construction, and it is worth naming plainly.

Once a net is rigged and signed off, the trades above work on the basis that a fall will be arrested. Roofers, steel erectors, cladding fixers and followers on behave differently because the net is there, which is the point of it. So a net that does not perform does not merely fail to help; it has removed the caution that would otherwise have existed. The failures are specific: an anchorage into something that could not take the load, a gap at an edge or a column, a net not tied at the required spacing, insufficient clearance beneath so somebody reaches a floor or a beam, and a net beyond its service life.

So the installation record and the handover are the whole defence. A rig drawing or plan showing anchorage positions and net layout, a handover certificate stating the rig is complete and the areas it covers and crucially the areas it does not, the net identification and its test certificate recorded, and a sign off with the principal contractor. Where an area cannot be netted, say so in writing rather than leaving a gap and assuming somebody noticed, because an uncovered area that looks netted is worse than one that obviously is not.

A net looks like fabric and behaves like a structural element the moment somebody falls into it.

Arresting a falling person generates a substantial dynamic load, and that load goes into the anchorage and then into the structure. A tie into a purlin that was not designed for it, into timber of unknown condition, into masonry with a single fixing, or into cladding rails that are not load bearing may hold under static conditions and fail at the moment it matters. On a steel frame the anchorage points may be adequate; on a refurbishment, an older roof, or a timber structure the capacity is frequently unknown.

So the anchorage question is engineering rather than rigging practice. Anchorage positions chosen against the structure's actual capacity rather than convenience, the structure confirmed where there is doubt, proprietary systems used as the manufacturer specifies rather than adapted, and a record of what was used where. This is also where professional indemnity earns its place, because a failure traced to an anchorage decision is an advisory failure rather than a workmanship one, and most netting contractors hold liability cover only.

Nets are modified by people who did not install them, and that is the most common reason a net is not in the condition the certificate describes.

A following trade unties a section to get a bundle through and does not retie it. A service penetration is cut through a net. A net is pulled aside for a lift and left slack. Debris and materials accumulate in a net, which both loads it and reduces its effectiveness. A section is damaged by hot work above it. None of that is reported, and the certificate on the wall still says the rig was satisfactory when it was installed.

So inspection after installation is not optional and the responsibility needs to be clear. Establish in writing who inspects the nets during the works and at what frequency, carry out and record inspections where that is your contract, report alterations and damage in writing to the principal contractor rather than retying quietly, and refuse to re-certify a rig that has been altered without assessing it properly. On taking over somebody else's nets, inspect the whole rig against the drawing rather than spot checking, because from the certificate date its arrangement is your assessment.

There is an uncomfortable logic in this trade that shapes its employers' liability exposure.

Netting is installed so that other people are protected, which means the riggers are working at height on a structure that has no fall protection yet, frequently on a bare steel frame, on purlins, or at an edge, using work positioning and fall arrest from the structure itself. They then move across the frame installing the net progressively. The exposures are a fall during installation, a fall while moving across members, and a dropped net or tool onto the area below.

So this is where an insurer concentrates, and the answers are about method and competence. Recognised training for netting riggers rather than general working at height, a defined installation method that gives positive protection during the rig, work positioning and fall arrest anchored to assessed points, exclusion of the area beneath during installation, and a rule about weather. Expect questions about whether riggers are employed or supplied, because labour only netting crews are common and who carries their injuries depends on the arrangement.

Failure to perform is the question, and it is not a damage claim. We are an FCA regulated broker and will not tell you we are the best choice. These are the questions that decide it.