How to Evaluate Loss Prevention Services for a Shutdown

What do industrial loss prevention services cover on a shutdown?

Industrial loss prevention services are the on-site personnel, monitoring and control functions that prevent an incident from starting, and contain it if it does. On a Canadian shutdown or turnaround, that scope typically includes fire and spark watch during hot work, hole watch and confined space attendance, atmospheric and gas testing, access and accountability control at work fronts, standby rescue and medical response, and the documentation trail that proves all of it happened.

The word "loss" is doing real work in that definition. A loss prevention program is concerned with more than injury. It is concerned with the fire that idles a unit for three days, the confined space entry that has to be re-permitted because nobody recorded the gas test, the contractor crew standing down because a rescue team was not in position, and the regulatory order that stops work across the entire site rather than the one work front where the violation occurred.

Loss prevention is not site security

These functions are frequently confused during scoping, and the confusion produces bids that are not comparable.

Site security controls the perimeter: gates, patrols, theft, trespassing, property protection. In most Canadian provinces, security work performed on public property is a licensed activity governed by provincial security services legislation.

Loss prevention operates inside the fence, at the work front. Its personnel hold occupational safety competencies — confined space entry and monitoring, hot work fire watch, gas detection, first aid, rescue — rather than security licensing. Where loss prevention personnel do control access, they are controlling accountability: who is authorized to be in a permitted space, who is currently inside it, and whether everyone is out before the space is closed.

A provider can legitimately deliver both, or either. What matters at scoping is that you know which one you are buying, and that the bid you are comparing is scoped against the same function. Ask directly whether the provider holds a provincial security licence, and whether the personnel they are quoting are licensed security officers or safety personnel. The answer changes the price, the training file and the legal exposure.

Why turnarounds concentrate loss exposure

Three things happen simultaneously during a turnaround, and each one degrades a control that operates well during normal production.

Hazards move from contained to exposed. Vessels that were sealed are opened. Lines that were in service are broken. Atmospheres that were stable become variable. Hot work is performed in areas where it is prohibited during operation. Transient operations of exactly this kind — shutdown, maintenance intervention and start-up — are recognized in insurance loss analysis as a root cause category for process safety incidents. Marsh has separately warned that deferring turnaround and inspection work builds a backlog that can itself become a common cause of losses in subsequent years.

The workforce is unfamiliar. A turnaround crew is assembled from multiple contractors, many of whom have never worked this plant, on a schedule that does not allow for a slow orientation curve. Site knowledge that permanent operators carry in their heads is not available to them.

Accountability fragments. During production, one employer controls the area. During a turnaround, a dozen employers work adjacent to and above one another. This is not an operational inconvenience — in Canadian OHS law it is a defined legal condition that triggers specific duties, discussed below.

Loss prevention is the function that compensates for all three. It puts a trained person at the point where the hazard is exposed, gives that person the authority to stop the work, and creates a record that the control was in place.

Six criteria for evaluating an industrial loss prevention provider

1. Scope built from your permit load, not your headcount

The most common scoping error is pricing loss prevention as a ratio of total site headcount. It is not a headcount function. It is a permit function.

Build the scope from your work plan:

• How many simultaneous hot work permits at peak? Each one that cannot be isolated from combustibles needs a dedicated fire or spark watch, and the watch continues after the torch is off.
• How many confined spaces open at peak, and how many entry points does each have? A vessel with two open manways is not one hole watch position.
• How many of those spaces are classified as high hazard, requiring standby rescue in position rather than on call?
• How many shifts, and does night shift coverage carry the same permit load?
• What is the gas testing frequency your entry permits specify, and who holds the detector?

A provider who can build this table with you during the bid — rather than asking how many bodies you want — is demonstrating that they have run turnarounds before. A provider who quotes a flat crew size without seeing the permit plan is guessing, and the variance will land on you as a change order in week two.

2. Competency you can audit before mobilization

Every provider will tell you their people are trained. Ask to see the file before you award, not on day one of mobilization.

Specify what you require in the contract, by name:

• Confined space entry and monitoring certification, with the issuing body and expiry date
• Fire watch or spark watch training aligned to the standard your site uses
• Gas detector operation, including bump test and calibration competency for the specific instrument model in use
• Current first aid certification at the level your provincial regulation requires for the site's remoteness and worker count
• Respirator fit test records, current and matched to the make and model of respirator the worker will wear
• For rescue personnel: rescue-specific training, with evidence of practice drills

That last point is a regulatory requirement in British Columbia, not a nice-to-have. WorkSafeBC's confined space provisions require that every person assigned rescue duties is properly equipped and adequately trained, that a practice drill is conducted at least annually, and that the employer maintains records of both training and drills. If a provider cannot produce drill records, they cannot demonstrate compliance.

Also ask how the provider verifies competency at the point of mobilization, not just at hire. On a large turnaround, a provider may be sourcing from a broad field pool. The question is whether every worker who badges in has a verified, current, matched certification file — and whether you can see it on demand when an officer asks.

3. Response readiness measured in minutes

"We provide rescue coverage" is not a specification. The specification is a time, a location and a capability.

Establish three things for every high-hazard space on the plan:

• Where the rescue team is positioned. In position at the space, or staged elsewhere on site? The difference is measured in minutes, and minutes are the entire variable in a confined space atmosphere event.
• What entry capability they hold. Entry rescue and non-entry retrieval are different services requiring different equipment and different training. Confirm which one is quoted.
• How the emergency is initiated and by whom. Who calls it, on what channel, and what happens to the rest of the work front when they do.

Two regulatory anchors are worth writing into the contract. First, WorkSafeBC's rescue provisions require that a rescue worker not enter a confined space unless at least one additional worker is located outside to render assistance, and that self-contained breathing apparatus or an air-supplied respirator with escape bottle be used during rescue operations in an unknown or IDLH atmosphere. Second, in Alberta, the Occupational Health and Safety Code requires an effective rescue capability for confined space work — not merely a rescue plan on paper.

Ask the provider to walk you through the rescue plan for your single worst space, on the drawing, before you award. The quality of that answer is the most reliable predictor of field performance in the entire evaluation.

4. Fit with your prime contractor structure

A turnaround is a textbook multiple-employer workplace, and Canadian OHS law assigns specific coordination duties when that condition exists. Your loss prevention provider sits inside that structure, and how they sit inside it should be explicit in the contract.

In British Columbia, section 24 of the Workers Compensation Act requires the prime contractor of a multiple-employer workplace to ensure that the health and safety activities of all employers, workers and other persons at the workplace are coordinated, and to do everything reasonably practicable to establish and maintain a system or process ensuring compliance. Each employer must give the prime contractor the name of the person designated to supervise its workers on that site. Critically, where there is no written agreement designating a prime contractor, the owner of the workplace is the prime contractor by default.

In Alberta, the person in control of the work site must designate a prime contractor in writing at oil and gas and construction work sites where two or more employers are involved, and the prime contractor's name must be posted in a visible place at the site. If no designation is made, the person in control is deemed to be the prime contractor.

The scope of that designation has been tested. In a 2024 Alberta Labour Relations Board decision arising from a fatality at a Fort McMurray chemical plant, the Board held that prime contractor status attaches to a defined work site, not to a particular scope of work — a facility owner could not carve out the area where a roofing contractor was working and treat it as a separate site with a separate prime. Site owners and turnaround managers should not assume that assigning a contractor to a work front transfers coordination duty for that area.

For your evaluation, this means asking: who does the loss prevention supervisor report to on site, how do they participate in the daily coordination meeting, and what is the escalation path when their personnel identify a hazard created by a different employer's crew? A provider whose people report only to their own office is a coordination gap.

5. Documentation that survives an audit

Everything loss prevention does generates a record, and the value of that record is realized months later, in one of three conversations: an incident investigation, a regulatory inspection, or a COR or ISO 45001 audit.

Ask to see the actual forms and the actual output, not a description:

• What does a completed hole watch log look like at end of shift?
• Where is the gas test result recorded, and is the reading time-stamped?
• How is a personnel-in-space record maintained, and how is it reconciled at space closure?
• Is the record paper, digital, or both — and if digital, can your team access it during the turnaround or only in a report afterward?
• Who retains the records after demobilization, for how long, and in what format?

Digital systems change this materially. Where confined space monitoring is instrumented — badge-based access control, continuous gas detection logged to a central point, camera visibility into the space, recorded intercom — the entry record is generated as a by-product of the work rather than transcribed from a clipboard. That distinction matters most when an investigator asks what the atmosphere was at 14:20 on a Tuesday three weeks ago.

6. Surge, night shift and demobilization capacity

Turnaround scopes change. Discovery work in week one routinely adds vessels, and the loss prevention requirement moves with it.

Ask three specific questions:

• If the permit load increases 30 percent in week two, what is the realistic time to field additional qualified personnel, and where do they come from?
• Is the night shift crew the same calibre as day shift, or is the experienced supervision all on days?
• What is the demobilization process, and are you paying for coverage after the permit load drops?

Regional presence is the practical answer to the first question. A provider drawing from crews already working in your region can field people in a different timeframe than one flying a crew in. Ask where the nearest resourcing base is, and ask for it in writing.

Provincial requirements that shape your scope

Loss prevention scope is driven by provincial regulation, and multi-province operators cannot assume the requirements travel. The table below summarizes the primary instruments. It is a starting point for scoping, not a compliance determination — requirements are amended regularly and the applicable duty always depends on the specific worksite and hazard assessment.

Where the same crew works across provinces during a turnaround season, the practical risk is not ignorance of the local rule — it is applying the previous site's rule out of habit. A provider operating in multiple jurisdictions should be able to tell you, without looking it up, how their procedure changes when the crew crosses a provincial line.

Enforcement is not theoretical. WorkSafeBC reported imposing 410 administrative penalties in 2025, totalling $13.7 million.

Twelve questions to ask before you award the contract

Put these in the RFP. The answers are more diagnostic than the price.

1. Build the coverage table from our permit plan — how many positions, on which shifts, at peak?
2. Which of the personnel you are quoting are safety personnel and which, if any, are licensed security officers?
3. Can we review certification files for the specific crew you intend to mobilize, before mobilization?
4. What are your rescue positioning and response times for our highest-hazard space, on the drawing?
5. Is entry rescue or non-entry retrieval quoted, and what equipment is included?
6. Show us drill records for the rescue personnel assigned to this project.
7. Who does your site supervisor report to, and how do they participate in daily coordination?
8. What is your stop-work authority in the field, and how is it exercised across employer lines?
9. Show us a completed shift log, gas test record and space closure record from a comparable project.
10. If our permit load rises 30 percent in week two, what is your realistic fielding time and from where?
11. What documentation do we receive at demobilization, and in what format?
12. What is your record with the regulator in each province where you will supply personnel on this project?

Five signals that a bid is under-scoped

• A flat crew number with no reference to the permit plan. The scope was estimated, not built.
• Rescue described as "available" rather than positioned. Availability is not a response time.
• Certification described in general terms. "All personnel are fully trained" is not auditable.
• No named site supervisor. Coordination fails at the seams between employers, and the seams are exactly where a supervisor is needed.
• A price materially below the field. On a turnaround, the usual explanation is a thinner crew, a lower certification level, or rescue coverage that is staged rather than in position. Ask which.

Where Irwin's Safety fits

Irwin's Safety and Industrial Labour Services Ltd supports Canadian shutdowns and turnarounds with the loss prevention functions described above delivered as a coordinated package rather than as separate vendor relationships. On turnaround projects, that scope has included confined space attendants and monitors, fire and spark watch, gas testing, safety coordination, industrial labour, technical rescue workers and first aid personnel, with consulting support from certified practitioners including CRSPs, CHSCs, Registered Occupational Hygienists, Certified Industrial Hygienists, NCSOs, Emergency Medical Responders and certified COR and ISO auditors.

The practical argument for consolidating these functions is coordination, not procurement convenience. When the hole watch, the fire watch, the gas tester, the rescue team and the documentation all sit with one provider, there is one supervisor in the daily coordination meeting, one escalation path when scope changes at 2 a.m., and one consistent record set when an auditor asks to see the entry permit, the atmospheric log and the rescue plan in the same conversation.

Where the monitoring itself can be instrumented, Irwin's digital confined space monitoring system combines badge-based access control, camera visibility, continuous communication and remote gas detection — producing an entry record generated by the work rather than transcribed after it.

Irwin's operates from locations across Canada, including Calgary and Edmonton in Alberta, Regina in Saskatchewan, Sudbury and Toronto in Ontario, Winnipeg in Manitoba, Halifax and St. John's in Atlantic Canada, and Kelowna, Prince George, Prince Rupert, Kitimat, Vancouver, Victoria, Elkford, Powell River, Rossland and Maple Ridge in British Columbia.

FAQs

What is included in industrial loss prevention services?

On an industrial shutdown, loss prevention typically includes fire and spark watch for hot work, hole watch and confined space attendance, atmospheric and gas testing, access and accountability control at permitted work fronts, standby rescue and first aid response, and the shift documentation that records all of it. Exact scope is set by the site's permit plan and the applicable provincial regulation.

How is loss prevention different from site security?

Site security protects the perimeter and the asset against theft, trespassing and property loss, and on public property it is a licensed activity in most provinces. Loss prevention operates at the work front and is staffed by personnel holding occupational safety competencies — confined space monitoring, fire watch, gas detection, first aid and rescue. Where loss prevention personnel control access, they are controlling authorization and accountability for a permitted space rather than providing security.

How many loss prevention personnel does a turnaround need?

The number is driven by the permit plan, not by total site headcount. Count simultaneous hot work permits, open confined space entry points, high-hazard spaces requiring standby rescue in position, gas testing frequency and shift structure. A provider who can build that table with you from your work plan is scoping; one who quotes a flat crew size is estimating.

Who is responsible for coordinating safety when multiple contractors work a shutdown?

In British Columbia, the prime contractor of a multiple-employer workplace carries the coordination duty under section 24 of the Workers Compensation Act, and where no written designation exists the owner is the prime contractor by default. In Alberta, the person in control of the work site must designate a prime contractor in writing and post the name on site, and is deemed prime if they do not. Ontario uses the constructor concept on projects. Loss prevention personnel work inside that structure, and their reporting line should be explicit in the contract.

What documentation should a loss prevention contractor provide?

At minimum: shift logs by position, time-stamped atmospheric and gas test records, personnel-in-space records reconciled at space closure, hot work watch records including the post-work watch period, incident and near-miss reports, and current certification and fit test files for every worker mobilized. Confirm before award who retains the records after demobilization, in what format, and for how long.

Can one provider supply loss prevention, rescue and labour for the same shutdown?

Yes, and on contractor-heavy turnarounds there is a coordination argument for it: a single supervisor in the daily meeting, a single escalation path when scope changes, and one consistent record set across every service line. What matters is that each function is separately scoped and separately competent — bundling should not blur the specification for rescue positioning, certification levels or documentation.

Scoping loss prevention for an upcoming turnaround?

Send us your permit plan and shift structure. Irwin's Safety will build the coverage table with you — positions, shifts, rescue positioning and documentation — so you are comparing bids against a specification rather than a crew count.