Programme 01 · Control of Noise at Work Regulations 2005
Audiometry and hearing health surveillance
Noise-induced hearing loss is permanent, cumulative and almost always silent until it is advanced. Audiometric surveillance exists to detect the shift while it can still be acted on, and the law requires it wherever noise exposure is high enough.
Hearing loss is permanent, gradual, and silent until it is advanced. Surveillance exists to catch the shift while it can still be acted on.
The duty
What the Noise Regulations require
The Control of Noise at Work Regulations 2005 set exposure values that drive different duties. Health surveillance, in the form of audiometric testing, is required where workers are regularly exposed at or above the upper exposure action values, and also where they are at risk for another reason, for example an existing hearing condition, or particular susceptibility.
Source: HSE, health surveillance for hearing, and the Control of Noise at Work Regulations 2005. Confirm your own exposures against a competent noise assessment.
Who is in scope
Where the duty usually bites
Noise exposure is about the whole shift, not the loudest moment. A worker who spends four hours next to a running press can be in scope even if no single task sounds extreme. Work commonly reaching the upper action values includes:
- Fabrication, forging, pressing, stamping and foundry work
- Machining, grinding, cutting and deburring
- Construction sites, particularly breaking, piling and cutting
- Quarrying, aggregates and heavy plant operation
- Woodworking, joinery and sawmills
- Bottling, canning and high-speed packing lines
- Engine and vehicle testing, and airside ground operations
Being issued with hearing protection does not remove the duty. The action values are assessed on exposure at the ear before protection is taken into account; only the exposure limit values consider protection.
The programme
What surveillance involves, and how often
The core of the programme is audiometry: a hearing test across the relevant frequencies, performed under controlled conditions, compared against the worker's own baseline rather than only against a population norm. It is supported by a health questionnaire covering symptoms, history and protection use.
- Baseline on entryBefore or as soon as possible after a worker starts noise-exposed work, so later changes can be measured against their own starting point.
- Frequent testing in the early yearsHSE guidance recommends annual testing for the first two years of exposure, when early damage is most likely to show.
- Periodic testing thereafterCommonly at around three-yearly intervals once the early period has passed, brought forward if a test shows a shift or the worker reports symptoms.
- Categorisation and referralResults are categorised, and warning or referral level findings route to a clinician for review, advice to the worker, and advice to you on controls.
When something is found
What an adverse result obliges you to do
A hearing finding is not only a matter for the individual. It is evidence about your controls, and the regulations treat it that way. Where surveillance identifies identifiable hearing damage attributable to noise at work, you are expected to review the risk assessment and the control measures, consider the worker's continued exposure and any adjustment, and consider whether others doing the same work are affected.
Occupational noise-induced hearing loss diagnosed by a doctor is also reportable to the enforcing authority under RIDDOR where the criteria are met. Polarisk flags the reporting question with the outcome rather than leaving you to discover it.
How Polarisk runs it
The programme, without the administration
The duty is mapped
Roles map to audiometric surveillance on the exposure criteria, so the list of who is owed an assessment is derived rather than remembered. Workers who need none are evidenced as such.
Each worker answers privately
A single-use link, bound to that person at issue and spent on use. Your organisation's own account is refused at the answers.
Protocol triages, a human judges
Responses are scored against the protocol and drafted for review. A registered clinician reads every case and signs under their own name and registration number.
The cycle runs itself
Due dates, reminders and lapse tracking are handled. You are told who has not answered, by name, while there is still time to act.
Evidence is generated
The audit pack comes from the live record: duty map, completion by site, certificate register and the sign-off trail behind each judgment.
Appointed-Doctor streams
Asbestos, lead, ionising radiation and compressed air require an HSE Appointed Doctor. We do not run those, and will say so rather than quote for them.
Questions
Common questions
Do we need audiometry if everyone wears hearing protection?
Usually yes. The upper exposure action values that trigger health surveillance are assessed on the noise reaching the worker before hearing protection is taken into account. Protection is considered only against the exposure limit values. Relying on protection also assumes it is worn correctly and continuously for the whole exposure, which surveillance is partly there to test.
How often does audiometry have to be repeated?
HSE guidance recommends a baseline, then annual testing for the first two years of noise-exposed work, then testing at longer intervals, commonly around every three years. Intervals shorten again if a test shows a significant shift, if the worker reports symptoms, or if exposure changes. The interval is a clinical decision informed by guidance, not a fixed legal number.
Who can carry out the hearing test?
Audiometry must be carried out by someone competent to do it, under suitable conditions, with equipment that is calibrated and maintained. The results must then be reviewed by a qualified person, with referral to a doctor where the findings require it. Polarisk records who performed and who reviewed each test, and both appear in the audit pack.
What happens to a worker who is found to have hearing damage?
The clinician gives the worker their result and advice directly, and issues your organisation a fitness outcome and any recommended adjustment. You are then expected to review controls for that person and for others doing the same work. Where a doctor diagnoses noise-induced hearing loss meeting the RIDDOR criteria, it is reportable.
We have never done audiometry and we should have. What now?
Start with the scale of it: how many people are in scope, and for how long they have been exposed without a baseline. That is what the surveillance check estimates. Establishing baselines now is better than continuing without them, and a documented plan to close a known gap is a far stronger position with an inspector than an undocumented one.
Start here
Find out what you owe before an inspector does
Four questions about your workforce and its exposures. You will get an estimate of the assessments owed each year, by programme, and where your current arrangement leaves a gap. No sign-up and no personal data.