Risk-based Oversight
What is risk-based oversight (RBO)?
ESA looks at the level of risk involved in electrical wiring work to determine when to visit a site. We call this "Risk-based Oversight" (RBO). This means spending more effort on high-risk electrical wiring work and less on low-risk work, without compromising safety.
ESA will assign a risk level to notifications based on:
- who does the installation work
- what the installation is
- where the installation is.
ESA recommends a site visit for all high-risk work. Medium- and low-risk work will be subject to selective site visits. An ESA Inspector might visit one site for every five notifications considered low-risk, for example. Or there might be one visit for every two medium-risk notifications.
RBO Guidebook
ESA has developed a Guidebook to help you understand all aspects of RBO, including
Download and view the RBO Guidebook
Why did ESA move to a risk-based approach?
We want to make it easier to do business with us. We believe this approach will help address your scheduling concerns. We'll be able to keep you better informed about when an inspector will visit a site. We'll also be able to focus on the work related to the greatest safety risks, such as investigating work done by unlicensed contractors.