Reporting portal adds extra languages and member dashboard

The International Powered Access Federation(IPAF) has made its worldwide accident reporting portal available in multiple languages and added a new interactive dashboard to allow members limited access to the latest available anonymised accident data, to assist in setting their own company’s safety protocols and to inform their strategy.

Last year, IPAF revamped its accident reporting portal (www.ipafaccidentreporting.org) to make it easier to report an accident or near-miss – near-miss information being particularly useful in preventing more serious accidents. The new portal works on multiple devices allow multiple users per company and have a feature for users to register subsidiary companies.

Now it is available in all main IPAF languages – Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Korean, Portuguese, Spanish and simplified Chinese – to maximise convenience for users across the world.

There is also a new dashboard feature for members to view and compare data sets from the latest available anonymised accident data, to brief and inform health and safety managers or those in charge of setting safety and training policy in powered access operations.

The new dashboard is available via the members’ area of the IPAF website at www.ipaf.org/en/resource-library/ipaf-accident-reporting-portal-members-dashboard – Members can log in to view data charts and access configurable graphs covering accidents sorted by date range, country, incident outcome and more.

Users are reminded the dashboard charts are intended for individual member use and are not to be used in external presentations or reports without express prior permission and approval; please email accidentreporting@ipaf.org to request this.

Brian Parker, IPAF’s Head of Safety & Technical, says: “We are pushing the new portal to demonstrate the enhanced user experience and also the benefits of gathering reliable data from all around the world. Having the portal now fully functioning in all the main IPAF languages is a great step forwards in this regard; giving all reporting members access to the data to share internally and to inform their own company safety strategy is just another of the ways IPAF is determined to build and make this vital data available to our members for the wider benefit of safety in the industry.”

Peter Douglas adds: “Since taking up post as CEO of IPAF, it has been a key objective of mine to renew the impetus of IPAF’s global reporting project. I’m pleased that increasing numbers of members around the world see the benefits of feeding into this.

“The new portal’s layout and added functionality is working well to increase take-up, and as a result, the data we are gathering is more granular and covers an even greater proportion of our industry, both in terms of geography and industry end-use.

“We are also hopeful that the new ePAL mobile app for operators will also encourage more people to report even more minor incidents, providing as it does easy hand-held access to the portal to make a report as either a logged-in user or anonymously.

“The IPAF Accident Reporting project, which I am proud to have been involved with since it began in 2012, is only as good as the data it can gather, and the usability of the analysis and statistics it generates. Having the portal available in all our core languages and also offering reporting members this new dashboard facility will help convince people of the underlying value of the project, to help keep our industry safe.

“IPAF uses this data to underpin nearly all of the things we do, from developing safety and technical guidance, awareness campaigns such as Andy Access posters to evolving or adding new courses into our global training programme.”

● IPAF will launch the Global MEWP Safety Report 2021 in a webinar online via Zoom at 14:00 (BST) on Tuesday 22 June. Live translation is available in Italian, Spanish, German, French, Portuguese, Dutch & Chinese, subject to demand. The webinar is sponsored by Sinoboom. For this and other upcoming IPAF events and webinars, please see www.ipaf.org/events. A previous IPAF webinar, Reducing Accidents Through Intelligence is available via www.ipaf.org/resources; both are free to view.