Create and manage a safety audit

  • Release version: Yokohama
  • Updated July 31, 2025
  • 4 minutes to read

    • Create a safety audit for a process or regulation with formalized assessment criteria, and record the information collected at each stage—before, during, and after the audit.

    Before you begin

    Role required: sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_manager or sn_hs_rm.safety_audit_writer

    About this task

    You can also set up an audit schedule to generate safety audits. For more information, see Set up a safety audit schedule.

    Procedure

    1. Navigate to Workspaces > Health and Safety Workspace.
    2. Select the risk management icon (Risk assessment icon).
    3. Select the Audits list and then All.
    4. Select New to create an audit.
      Alternatively, you can create an audit from
      • The Scheduled audits tab in an audit schedule.
      • The Create audits button that appears when a new audit schedule is saved.
    5. On the form, fill in the fields.
      Enter details such as the audit scope, its goals, regulation for the audit, and a start and end date.

      For information on audit field descriptions, see Audit schedule form.

    6. Select Save.
      The People involved, Documents, Audit surveys, Findings, Risk assessments, Observations, and Audit actions tabs appear for this audit.
    7. In the People involved tab, select New to add people involved in this audit and their responsibilities.
      Note:
      • The Visitors involved field appears only when the Workplace Visitor Management (com.sn_wsd_visitor) application is installed on your instance. For more information, see Additional features in Health and Safety.
      • The Contractor option appears only when the Health and Safety Contractor Management (sn_hs_crm) application is installed on your instance. The field only lists users who have the [snc_external] role assigned to them and have their Health and Safety profile created. For more information, see Assign Health and Safety profile to a user.
    8. In the Documents tab, add standards and documents used to benchmark findings.
    9. In the Audit surveys tab, add and assign smart assessments or surveys to be conducted as part of this audit.
      If the audit is part of an audit schedule with an associated audit survey, that survey is automatically added to the audit record. For information on audit survey field descriptions, see Audit survey form.
    10. Review the survey responses and gather evidence as part of the audit, for example, document assessments, interviews, and observations.
      1. In the Audit surveys tab of a survey, review the the smart assessment or survey responses that are submitted by the assigned user.
        When completed, the assessment results are available in the following tabs:
        • Questionnaire results tab for a smart assessment.
        • Audit survey results tab for an inspection survey.
      2. In the Findings tab, add an audit finding gathered from survey responses and perform its root cause analysis.
        For more information, see Add a finding and root cause analysis for a safety audit.
        Note:
        Safety auditors can also create actions and findings for specific questions while completing a smart assessment or survey in the mobile app. When an agent creates an action for a question, the system also generates a related finding record based on the response. The finding then appears in this tab in the workspace. For more information, see Create actions and findings for the smart assessment questionnaire from mobile app.
      3. In the Risk assessments tab, select New to conduct a risk assessment as part of this audit.
      4. In the Observations tab, add an observation recorded from this audit.
        • Select Add to add an existing observation.
        • Select New to create and submit a new observation.
      5. In the Audit actions tab, select New to create and assign any actions based on findings and recommendations.
        For more information, see Add an action for a safety inspection or audit.
        Note:
        Any actions created for specific questions while completing the smart assessment or survey in the Employee Center or mobile app also appear in this tab.
    11. Optional: If needed, complete the audit surveys directly from the audit record in the workspace.
      1. Open the assessment to be completed.
        • For a smart assessment, select Open audit smart assessment.
          Note:
          Only a user with the Assessment reader role can access and complete this smart assessment. This role is set during the smart assessment template configuration. For more information, see Configure the smart assessment template for safety inspections and audits.
        • For an inspection survey, select Open audit survey.
      2. Answer the survey questions and select Submit.
      3. In the State field, select Closed Complete to close the audit survey.
    12. Optional: In the Details tab, set the state to Closed Complete after all audit activities are complete and then select Save.
      The audit moves to the Closed Complete state.
    13. Optional: Generate a report for the safety audit, if needed.
      1. Select Generate report.
        Note:
        The Generate report button appears only when the Audit [sn_hs_rm_audit] table is enabled for report field mapping. For more information, see Enable a Health and Safety table for configuring report field mapping.
      2. In the Generate report dialog box, select a report mapping in the Select report field.
        Only the report mapping forms created and published for the Audit [sn_hs_rm_audit] table are available to select in the Select report field. For more information, see Create a safety report field mapping for generating reports.
      3. Select Generate.