What is an Independent Safety Assessment?

Undergoing an Independent Safety Assessment (ISA) gives managers the confidence that their projects are meeting recognised industry, legal and regulatory standards.

Why are Independent Safety Assessments important?

An ISA demonstrates that your business is committed to operating in a safe, sustainable and efficient manner, sending a reassuring message of transparency to passengers, regulators, investors and employees.

Ricardo can provide ISA services as either an accredited (via Ricardo Certification) or non-accredited service. 

A rail industry first

In 2016 we become the first independent assurance provider in the rail market to offer a UKAS accredited ISA service.

To earn this accreditation, our ISA processes and structures were assessed against BS EN ISO/IEC 17020 Type A, showing our commitment to the highest levels of competence, independence and consistency.

We have worked on changes to complex products, overseen updates to existing systems, and supported new railways from initial design to commission.

The service typically applies the CENELEC EN50126 and EN50129 standards as the basic criteria against which the safety engineering of railway products and systems are assessed. They define a systems and safety engineering lifecycle and the contents of safety cases for railway safety systems.

These standards call up a range of other relevant standards such as CENELEC EN50128 and EN50657 for software, CENELEC EN50121 for electromagnetic compatibility, and CENELEC EN50159 for communications.

However, ISA work can be performed against other relevant standards, such as IEC 61508. We can also apply standards directly relevant to electrical and mechanical systems and civil structures for specific products and railway sub-systems.

Get in touch with our experts

Find out more about how we can help you by contacting our service leader, Stephen Clarke (see panel) or by email: [email protected]