HSG47 is the Health and Safety Executive guidance for avoiding danger from underground services. If you commission, plan, manage or carry out ground works in the UK, this guidance is essential reading. Below is a plain English summary of what it covers, why it matters, and how Digsure helps you meet it in practice.
What is HSG47
HSG47 explains the risks when working near buried electricity cables, gas pipelines, water mains, and communications ducts, and sets out how to control those risks. It focuses on three essentials, planning the work, locating and identifying underground services, and excavating safely. The guidance is aimed at clients, designers, contractors, and utility owners alike.
Why HSG47 matters
Striking a cable or a pipe can cause severe injury, service outages, environmental harm, and significant cost. Following HSG47 helps you reduce that risk, demonstrate due diligence, and protect people, programmes, and budgets. It also supports your legal duties under UK health and safety law.
Who should follow it
Anyone who commissions or undertakes excavation or intrusive work should apply HSG47, including developers, principal designers, principal contractors, local authorities, and utility providers. It is equally relevant to survey, trial pits, fencing, and small ground works.
The three essentials of a safe system of work
Plan the work
Plan early and gather information, including utility searches, service records, site history and constraints. Define responsibilities, brief the team, and set control measures before anyone breaks ground.
Locate and identify services
Obtain up to date plans, use locating devices competently, mark out likely routes, and use trial holes to confirm positions and status. Treat information as indicative until confirmed on site.
Excavate safely
Adopt cautious techniques within tolerance zones, hand dig where required, use insulated tools, maintain supervision, and stop work if conditions differ from the plan.
Practical steps that show compliance
- Request comprehensive third party utility searches and keep records on site.
- Use competent people for utility detection and maintain calibration and training records.
- Mark services clearly, protect exposed services, and control plant movements.
- Use permits to dig, toolbox talks, and point of work risk assessments.
- Record changes and update drawings and asset information for handover.
How Digsure helps you work to HSG47
We provide clear, consolidated utility packs, rapid twenty four hour turnaround options, and accurate CAD utility drawings. Our data helps you plan routes, avoid sensitive areas, and brief your teams with confidence. If you need a drawing to accompany permits to dig, we can supply DGN, DXF, and AutoCAD formats to suit your workflow.