STANDARDS · IRATA
Every IRATA inspection on record
Schedule your pre-use, interim and detailed inspections, and keep every result and certificate on the item's record.
No credit card required.
What is IRATA and why does it matter?
IRATA, the Industrial Rope Access Trade Association, is the industry body for rope access: it sets the safety and training standards the industry works to, and publishes the International Code of Practice (ICOP) that member companies and technicians are audited against.
Membership means a company's rope access work meets a recognised standard, trained, certified and inspected the same way wherever the job is: construction, energy, offshore and more.
In Papertrail, each piece of equipment can have its own schedule for each type of inspection, signed off by a competent person and kept on a permanent record.
- What it is
- the industry body for rope access
- Code of practice
- the International Code of Practice (ICOP)
What an IRATA equipment record should contain
Each item's record can hold the details ICOP asks for: identity (manufacturer, model, serial number), history (purchase date, first use, every inspection and its result) and paperwork (safe working load, certificate of conformity).
Every inspection, service and repair is logged against that same record, so the full history is there when an auditor asks.
No credit card required.
Every ICOP check, on schedule
Schedule Manager
Pre-use, interim and detailed inspections each run on their own frequency per item, with an alert before anything falls due.
Inspections
Every inspection records who did it, when and the outcome, on the item's own history. Restrict who's allowed to sign one off.
Checklist Editor
Manufacturer-approved checklists for 120+ brands, including Petzl, DMM and Teufelberger. Build your own with the Checklist Editor on Expert and Enterprise.
Scanning (NFC/QR)
Tag rope access equipment and pull up its full history, even offline in a synced account.
Schedule Manager
Pre-use, interim and detailed inspections each run on their own frequency per item, with an alert before anything falls due.
Inspections
Every inspection records who did it, when and the outcome, on the item's own history. Restrict who's allowed to sign one off.
Checklist Editor
Manufacturer-approved checklists for 120+ brands, including Petzl, DMM and Teufelberger. Build your own with the Checklist Editor on Expert and Enterprise.
Scanning (NFC/QR)
Tag rope access equipment and pull up its full history, even offline in a synced account.
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Checklist Editor
Inspect
Use manufacturer-approved checklists for any equipment type, from lifting gear to PPE inspection records. Build your own with the Checklist Editor on Expert and Enterprise.
Related modules
PPE
Harnesses, lanyards and fall arrest equipment, each with its own inspection history.
Staff Competency
IRATA qualification levels and renewal dates, tracked centrally so you can show who's signed off to work.
Document Control
Method statements, risk assessments and certificates, held alongside the equipment they concern.
Who this applies to
See how rope access teams use Papertrail → /industries/rope-access
Frequently asked questions
How often must rope access equipment be inspected under IRATA?
There are three levels of check: a pre-use check before each day's use, a detailed inspection by a competent person before the equipment first goes into service and then at least every 6 months, and an interim inspection after arduous or exceptional use, such as chemical exposure or heavy dust or grit.
Who counts as a competent person for IRATA equipment inspections?
Someone with sufficient practical and theoretical knowledge to detect defects and assess their significance, who is independent and impartial enough to have the authority to discard equipment. They can work in-house or be brought in externally. Papertrail can also restrict who's allowed to add or edit an inspection log at all, so authority in the system matches who's actually authorised to sign one off under ICOP.
Are digital inspection records acceptable for IRATA audits?
Yes. IRATA does not specify paper. What matters is that the record captures the right details, dated and attributable to a competent person. A properly kept digital record does that job at least as well as a paper logbook, and it is far harder to lose.
Does Papertrail support IRATA inspections out of the box?
Yes. Pre-use, interim and detailed inspections can each run as a separate schedule per item, with manufacturer checklists for 120+ brands and a permanent history for every piece of equipment.
Run every IRATA inspection from one record
No credit card required.
26 million inspections recorded· No obligation.
Last reviewed on . MJB.