Health & Safety providers across the UK

What health & safety covers, and what it does not

What health & safety costs

How it is priced: Monthly retainer, often bundled with HR support, or per-visit and per-assessment fees. Bundled with an HR contract it usually adds a modest monthly increment; standalone audits and assessments are quoted per site visit.

What moves the price

• Number of sites and how often they are visited
• Risk profile: construction and manufacturing cost more than an office
• Whether accreditation support, such as SSIP, is included
• Whether the competent person is named and reachable

Ranges are indicative of what UK employers commonly pay and are not quotes. City pages carry local bands where they differ.

Who health & safety suits

Questions to ask before you sign

1. 1Who is the named competent person and what are their qualifications?
2. 2How many site visits are included each year?
3. 3Is accreditation support, such as SSIP, inside the fee?
4. 4What happens if the HSE contacts us: is that covered or extra?
5. 5Do we get the assessments as documents we own?

Key terms

Competent person

The person an employer must appoint to help meet health and safety duties.

RIDDOR

The rules on reporting specified workplace injuries, diseases and dangerous occurrences.

SSIP

Safety Schemes in Procurement: the mutual-recognition umbrella covering accreditations buyers commonly ask for.

All health and safety consultants

• Avensure

  Outsourced HR, employment law and health & safety provider for UK employers.

• Peninsula Business Services

  UK provider of outsourced HR, employment law and health & safety services for employers.

• Croner

  Outsourced HR, employment law and health & safety advice for UK employers.

• WorkNest

  Employment law, HR and health & safety compliance solutions for employers.

• Citation

  HR, employment law and health & safety compliance services for growing UK businesses.

• BrightHR

  HR management software for UK small and medium-sized businesses.

• Guardian Support

  Outsourced HR and health & safety support for UK employers.

• Delphi Business Support Services

  HR, health and safety and employment law consultancy for the North of England.

• Crownford

  Employment law, HR and health and safety consultancy based in Cardiff.

• DCL Business Services

  HR, employment law and health & safety partner for SMEs and medical practices.

• Oxford People Solutions

  HR, operations and safety consultancy across Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Buckinghamshire.

Health & Safety questions employers ask

What is health & safety?

Health and safety support gives you competent-person advice, risk assessments, policy documentation and inspection support. Many UK providers sell it alongside HR because the two obligations overlap in practice, particularly on absence, stress and accident investigation.

How much does health & safety cost in the UK?

Monthly retainer, often bundled with HR support, or per-visit and per-assessment fees. Bundled with an HR contract it usually adds a modest monthly increment; standalone audits and assessments are quoted per site visit. The figures move most on: number of sites and how often they are visited; risk profile: construction and manufacturing cost more than an office; whether accreditation support, such as SSIP, is included. Always compare quotes on what is inside the fee rather than the headline number.

What is included in health & safety, and what is not?

Normally included: competent-person advice as required by regulation; risk assessments and method statements; health and safety policy and documented arrangements; accident reporting support, including riddor. Normally excluded or charged separately: defence of an hse prosecution, which needs specialist legal representation; fire risk assessment, sometimes a separate specialism; occupational health assessments and medicals.

Who should buy health & safety?

Employers with sites, vehicles, equipment or contractors, and anyone tendering for work where accreditation is a prerequisite. It is a poor fit for the opposite case: small low-risk office employers whose duties are limited, where a one-off assessment and a review cycle may be enough.

What should I ask before signing?

Five questions worth asking every provider on your shortlist: Who is the named competent person and what are their qualifications? How many site visits are included each year? Is accreditation support, such as SSIP, inside the fee? What happens if the HSE contacts us: is that covered or extra? Do we get the assessments as documents we own?

How many health and safety consultants are in this directory?

11 of the 96 providers we researched offer health & safety: 6 operate UK-wide, 5 cover a region, and 0 work mainly around one city. National firms are easier to buy from anywhere; local firms are usually easier to get into the room for a hearing.

Do UK employers legally have to have HR?

No. There is no legal requirement to employ an HR person or buy HR support. The duties themselves are not optional: written particulars of employment, statutory pay, working time records, pension auto-enrolment and a fair process before dismissal all apply from the first employee. Most small employers buy support because the cost of one badly handled dismissal exceeds the annual fee.