What is a Hazardous Area Verification Dossier?
Operators of facilities with hazardous areas in Australia are required to install equipment in accordance with AS/NZS6 0079.14, which states they must create and maintain a hazardous area verification dossier. But what does that mean exactly?
A verification dossier is a live document set detailing the design, installation and maintenance history of the electrical equipment for hazardous areas (EEHA) on site. A dossier is a key tool in ensuring the safety of the EEHA installation as it contains all the information needed to:
- Demonstrate that the installation is compliant to AS/NZS 60079.14;
- Show that the equipment is being inspected and maintained (AS/NZS 60079.17); and most importantly,
- Ensure ongoing operation, maintenance and modification works can be completed safely.
The information a verification dossier contains includes:
- Area classification documents,
- Equipment register
- Equipment certificates (including conditions of use)
- Design documents and calculations
- Information necessary for the repair of the electrical equipment
- Drawings and schedules
- Maintenance and inspection records
Historically, hazardous area dossiers have been paper folders or complicated filing structures on computer servers. They’re difficult to maintain and are commonly missing information (or missing entirely!), cluttered, chaotic, disorganised, dusty and downright unusable.
We’ve done away with all that. Ex-Online combines a cloud-based dossier with a digital inspection app which makes management of EEHA documentation and inspections easy. With Ex Online it’s easy to keep your dossier complete and up to date, and the documentation needed to maintain your facility is always organised and available.
You can find out more about the obligation for keeping a verification dossier in AS/NZS 60079.14 (clause 4.2). Or you can call us, we’d love to help, and have an office full of EEHA geeks who genuinely like talking about this stuff. (Don’t judge our passions. Some people collect snow globes.)