Bouncy Castle Annual Inspection Day
Inflatables need an annual inspection by a competent person. The HSE deems that RPII (and ADIPS) annual inflatable inspectors are competent to inspect that an inflatable meets the requirements of BSEN 14960:2013 (the standard that is followed in the UK by the Health and Safety Executive).
Essentially bouncy castles need testing once a year. The industry itself tries to avoid saying "test", as technically it's an inspection by a competent person, to BSEN 14960:2013. However, despite knowing it's an over-simplification and technically wrong to say "tested", it's become a bit of a phrase.
These annual inspections are a legal requirement. Technically a competent person could be proved to be any one, but the HSE only recognise the RPII and ADIPS, so having inflatables tested by anyone other than a person belonging to these two groups is rather pointless and in some cases un-safe.
We have always had our inflatables inspected by an RPII registered and qualified annual inflatable inspector. Some of ours where due December 3rd, with others not due till much later next year. However, to keep things simple and make sure that none are over-looked we decided to have the entire lot of them inspected in one go.
Three van trips and over 30 inflatables put up, inspected and packed away we where finally complete! We're very pleased to report that every single one of our inflatables passed it's inspection and are good again for another year! This is a big achievement, the inspections are ruthlessly rigorous and even the slightest possibility that any single part, no matter how small, is an instant fail. We're very pleased that ours have all passed and it's a testament to our own knowledge of the standard as well as how well we maintain the equipment.
The financial cost of this is significant. The hall hire and the helpers wages aren't insignificant, but the largest cost is the inspectors bill; There are not many of them in the country and they command a high daily rate, plus a charge per inflatable that they inspect. However, the cost is insignificant compared to the risk that not completing this carries. It's not just an inspection to see if the inflatables are safe, but it also sets the user limits and other important safety information.
There are many responsiblities to ensure safety is being considered, but this one is one of the most important. We take your safey very seriously and implore you to ask any bouncy castle company you use to produce or show you ahead of time their annual inspection certificate. If they can't, then this should be raising serious alarm bells!
We also opted to continue to have all of our inflatables PIPA tagged. Some inflatables are not covered by this scheme (inflatable ball pools and soft play for example) so they sadly cannot be tagged. Where possible, we paid extra to have a small blue disc called a PIPA tag physically put on the castle, slide or fun-run. This PIPA tag contains the PIPA number and can be looked up online on the PIPA website, here: https://www.pipa.org.uk/. This is something that we have done since day one and continue to do so.
This allows anyone to look up whether or not the inflatable has had an inspection, whether it is in date and if it passed or not. It isn't necessary, we could simply just have an RPII report and an inspectors certifcate as a hard copy, but we believe that having this data freely available for any one to see is reassuring. We've also added the test data to every single inflatable, so that you can see that it's valid and inspected while making a booking! Simply check out the "Tests" tab on the inflatable your booking!
A bit of a long and boring post to some, but it is our strong hope that this reassures our customers that they're making the right decision by booking with us, or at the very least challenge competitors to prove their annual inspections before booking.
Bouncy Castle Hire Dartford
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