Audit

We carry out regular safety audits through our safety assurance framework

Our Safety, Technical and Engineering (STE) team carries out approximately 25 independent Functional Audits per year. These audits are part of the team’s Level Two Functional Audit Programme (FAP) for Network Operations (the function of the business that operates the railway day to day).

Through FAP, the team provides safety assurance at operational sites such as managed stations, rail operating centres and electrical control rooms, and has introduced assurance activities within route health and safety procedures.

The FAP team carries out second line assurance activities by sampling key safety risks and working through our control framework to make sure that the control barriers that are in place are effective and applied.

Technical experts from Track, Signalling and Electrification and Plant conduct discipline-specific audits – looking at and working with our teams around the country in conjunction with our FAP team. This helps to provide an overview of compliance against mandated standards and working practices.

When the FAP team finds a control weakness they raise a Non-Conformance Report (NCR), which helps us improve and meet the standards required by compliance. The team records and manages the NCRs they issue in a central database, and auditees can update their progress and upload the necessary evidence. This data is used to highlight trends and provide Key Performance Indicator reports to the business.