Most asbestos register templates hand you a blank grid. This one applies the HSE material and priority scoring algorithms for you, then builds the register and the management plan.
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What this tool is. An assessment aid that applies the HSE material and priority scoring algorithms to information you already hold, and records the decisions you make from it. It is not an asbestos survey and cannot tell you whether a material contains asbestos — only a competent surveyor can do that, and only laboratory analysis can confirm the fibre type. It does not discharge your duties under the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012. Nothing you enter leaves your browser.
Step 1
Does the duty apply to you?
The duty to manage asbestos applies to non-domestic premises, and to the common parts of domestic premises such as blocks of flats. Three questions to confirm you are the right person to be filling this in.
The dutyholder is whoever owns the premises, or whoever has clear responsibility for their maintenance or repair, usually set by the lease or tenancy. Where nobody has that responsibility in writing, it falls to whoever controls the premises.
Step 2
Premises and dutyholder
These details head your register and management plan. They are what makes the document identifiable as yours when an inspector, contractor or insurer asks for it.
dd/mm/yyyy
dd/mm/yyyy
Defaults to 12 months. Review sooner if anything changes.
Step 3
Survey status
Everything downstream depends on this. The regulations let you either find out where asbestos is, or presume it is present and manage it as though it is. Both are lawful. Doing neither is not.
dd/mm/yyyy
Anyone whose work could disturb the fabric of a building put up before 2000 needs asbestos awareness training. Browse asbestos awareness courses ↗.
Step 4
Asbestos register
Add one entry for every material that is known or presumed to contain asbestos. Record where it is, what condition it is in, and how likely it is to be disturbed. Each entry is scored twice — once for the material itself, once for its situation.
Never sample it yourself
Do not drill, cut, scrape, break or take a piece of any material to find out whether it contains asbestos. Sampling is work with asbestos and needs a trained, competent person with the right controls. Describe what you can see from a safe distance and presume the worst until an analyst tells you otherwise.
0 entries
Step 5
Prioritised actions
Step 6
Management plan
A few arrangements the regulations expect you to have written down, then the plan assembles itself from everything above. Print it, sign it, and keep it where the people who need it can find it.
Keep a copy
Save the register to a file you can reopen and update later, or print the whole record. Nothing is stored on our servers, so the file you save is the only copy.
Save or reload a register
This tool keeps nothing between visits. Copy the code below and keep it with your records, or save the whole register to a file. Nothing is stored on our servers.
Before you save
A register naming a site, its asbestos and its condition is a sensitive document. Store and share the code or file accordingly, and keep the master copy under your own document control.
What is the duty to manage asbestos?
Regulation 4 of the Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 puts a legal duty on whoever is responsible for a non-domestic building. It covers the common parts of blocks of flats as well — the stairwells, corridors, lift shafts and boiler rooms — though not the inside of the individual flats.
The dutyholder is the owner, or whoever the lease or tenancy makes responsible for maintenance and repair. Where nobody holds that responsibility in writing, it falls on whoever controls the premises. It is worth settling in writing, because the ambiguity is where the duty tends to get dropped.
The duty has seven parts: take reasonable steps to find out whether asbestos is present and in what condition, presume it is present unless there is strong evidence otherwise, record what you find, assess the risk, write a plan to manage it, act on that plan, and give the information to anyone liable to disturb it. Reviewing it every twelve months is part of the same duty.
Material assessment and priority assessment: what is the difference?
The material assessment scores how readily a material would release fibres if it were disturbed — the product type, how damaged it is, whether the surface is sealed, and which fibre type it contains. It is a property of the material. A surveyor usually does this one and it comes back in the report.
The priority assessment scores something different: how likely the material is to be disturbed, and who is nearby when it happens. Occupant activity, accessibility, how many people use the space and for how long, and what maintenance work goes on around it.
That second half is the dutyholder’s job, not the surveyor’s, and it is the part most often left blank. A surveyor walking a building once cannot know that the store cupboard is opened forty times a day, or that the ceiling void above a corridor gets opened every time the lighting is worked on. Both halves run to a maximum of 12, giving a combined total out of 24.
Why a low material score does not mean safe
The two axes are independent. A material can be relatively harmless in itself but sit somewhere it gets knocked constantly, or be genuinely dangerous stuff locked in a roof void nobody enters. That is the whole reason the scoring is done twice, and it is why the ranking above is driven by the combined figure rather than either half on its own.
What should an asbestos register contain?
A register that will stand up to scrutiny needs six things for every material:
Where it is — specific enough that a contractor who has never been to the site can find it.
What it is — the material and roughly how much of it there is.
Whether it was identified or presumed — analysed samples and surveyor judgement are not the same evidence, and presumed materials are managed as though they are the worst fibre type.
Its condition — scored rather than just described, so changes between inspections are visible.
The material and priority scores — the two assessments that set the order of work.
When it was last inspected and when it is due again.
If a building has no asbestos, you still need a record saying so
A “no asbestos present” register, setting out what that conclusion was based on, is what demonstrates compliance if you are challenged. Silence does not.
Common questions
Do I need a survey, or can I just presume asbestos is present?
Presuming is lawful. The regulations let you presume asbestos is present and manage it as though it is, rather than surveying. What is not lawful is doing neither.
The catch is what presumption costs day to day. Every presumed material is treated as the most hazardous fibre type, and any work that might disturb it has to be handled as work with asbestos. For anything larger than a small unit, most dutyholders find a management survey cheaper than managing a whole site on presumption.
My building was built after 2000. Do I still have to do anything?
Yes, though not much. All remaining use of asbestos was prohibited in the UK from November 1999, so a building genuinely constructed from 2000 onwards is unlikely to contain it. The duty does not switch off, but a short recorded assessment naming the build date and the evidence relied on will satisfy it.
Be careful with extensions and refurbishments. A 2010 extension bolted onto a 1968 original does not make the original safe, and refurbishment work often leaves original materials hidden above new ceilings.
Can I take a sample myself to find out whether it is asbestos?
No. Taking a sample is work with asbestos. It needs a trained, competent person with the right controls, and doing it yourself risks releasing fibres in exactly the place you were trying to protect.
Describe what you can see from a safe distance, record it as presumed, and manage it as asbestos until an analyst says otherwise.
Does asbestos always have to be removed?
No, and removal is often the worse option. Asbestos in good condition, sealed and left undisturbed, releases no fibres. Removal disturbs it by definition, which is why it is licensed work for the higher-risk materials.
The scoring exists to tell you which materials genuinely need action and which are safer managed where they are. Most registers end up with a small number of items needing work and a majority simply monitored.
Who is allowed to work on asbestos?
It depends on the material, its condition and the work — not on the material alone. There are three categories. Licensed work covers sprayed coatings, lagging, loose fill and most work on insulating board, and only an HSE-licensed contractor may do it. Notifiable non-licensed work sits below that and must be notified to HSE, with medical surveillance and health records. Non-licensed work covers firmly bonded materials such as asbestos cement handled carefully without breaking them up.
All three need a written risk assessment and plan of work, trained operatives and licensed waste disposal. If you are not certain which applies, that is the point to take advice rather than guess.
How often should the register be reviewed?
The plan should be reviewed at least every twelve months. Individual materials should be re-inspected more often where the risk warrants it — HSE guidance sets a floor of at least every six to twelve months, with the interval reflecting the type of material, where it is and what condition it is in.
Any change resets the clock: damage, work carried out nearby, a change in how a space is used, or new information about what is present.
Is this tool free?
Yes. No signup, no email, no account. Everything runs in your browser and nothing you enter is sent to us. Copy the save code or print the page to keep a record.
Training that goes with this
Anyone whose work could foreseeably disturb the fabric of a building put up before 2000 needs asbestos awareness training — maintenance staff, electricians, plumbers, joiners, caretakers. It is a legal requirement rather than a recommendation, and it needs refreshing. Whoever holds the duty to manage needs more than awareness level.
Working out what else your staff need? The Health and Safety Training Matrix ↗ works out which courses apply to your workplace and tracks when each certificate expires, person by person.
Sources and verification
What was checked, against what, and when.
Checked against HSE published guidance on 28 July 2026. The following were verified against Health and Safety Executive sources on that date:
All four material assessment factors and all twenty scoring bands, transcribed from HSE’s published material and priority scoring tools. Maximum material score 12.
All four priority assessment groups and their eight sub-factors, including that normal occupant activity is taken as a single score while the other three groups are averaged. Maximum priority score 12; maximum combined score 24.
HSE’s own worked example — asbestos insulating board lining to a school skylight, drilled, with debris beneath — which this tool reproduces exactly at a priority score of 8.
That presumed and strongly presumed materials score 3 for asbestos type, because the fibre type is unknown.
The three work categories under CAR 2012 — licensed, notifiable non-licensed and non-licensed — and that which one applies depends on the material, its condition and the nature and duration of the work.
Re-inspection at least every six to twelve months, and review of the management plan at least every twelve months.
That blue and brown asbestos were banned in 1985 and all remaining use was prohibited from November 1999.
Sources. Control of Asbestos Regulations 2012 regulation 4; Managing and working with asbestos (L143, HSE); Asbestos: The survey guide (HSG264, HSE); A comprehensive guide to managing asbestos in premises (HSG227, HSE); Managing asbestos in buildings: A brief guide (INDG223, HSE); and HSE’s published material and priority scoring tools.
What was not verified
HSE publishes the priority algorithm without stating how to round the three averaged group scores. This tool rounds up, which is the conservative direction and matches published worked examples, but a surveyor’s software may round differently and produce a figure one or two points below this one. Every group shows its raw average alongside the rounded value so the two can be reconciled.
HSE also publishes no threshold table for the combined score out of 24. The high, medium, low and minor banding used here is a common management convention, not a regulatory determination, and the re-inspection intervals attached to each band are guidance rather than statutory periods.
Guidance changes
This verification describes the position on the date shown above, not necessarily today. Regulations, guidance and published values are all revised from time to time. If the date above is more than twelve months old, check current HSE guidance before relying on anything here. Envico does not undertake to notify users when guidance changes.
Contains public sector information published by the Health and Safety Executive and licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. This tool is not produced, endorsed or approved by HSE, and no official status is claimed for it. HSE’s own guidance is the authoritative source and should be consulted directly.
Review this register and plan every 12 months
Sooner if the condition of a material changes, if work is carried out that affects a recorded material, if the use or occupancy of an area changes, or if new information about the presence of asbestos comes to light. A register describes a building at a moment in time — when the building changes, the register stops being true.
