

Safety Culture Ladder Certification
Why Safety Ladder?
The Safety Ladder is developed by ProRail to measure and improve safety awareness within organisations in order to: reduce the number of unsafe situations.
The Safety Ladder consists of five steps. It is indicated per step which company aspects of management interests, employee involvement are in compliance with the entire chain of your company. The higher the step, the more aware your company handles the safety aspects within the organisation.
With Safety Ladders, as opposed to other schedules, the audit will not be assessed on the basis of documents but by talking to the parties involved. By interviewing employees of all layers within the organisation and by visiting projects, DAC will be able to assess the safety awareness within the organisation on the basis of these results.
Who could benefit from the Safety Ladder?
ProRail initially developed Safety Ladder for the railway infrastructure in order to reduce the number of unsafe situations on and around the tracks. Since other branches had the same needs, ProRail decided in October 2015 to release the schedule and Safety Ladder can be applied to every company. Safety Ladder is therefore interesting for every company that wants to test the safety awareness within the company. Several developments have been taking place since it was released.

Number of full time employees (FTEs) | |
Preferred step | |
Number of simultaneous projects per day | |
Work that has to be certified | |
Man-days table NEN |

Products Safety ladder
VL certification | SCL certification | SAQ+ assessment | SAQ assessment | ||
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Year 1 | Complete audit (according to man-days table) Certificate is valid for 1 yearMan-days according to tableNEN costs according to |
Year 1 | Complete audit (according to man-days table) Certificate is valid for 1 yearMan-days according to tableNEN costs according to |
Experience audit(40% of complete audit)
3 Year statement Man-days according to table (40%) with a minimum of 3 days (1.5 day per auditor) NEN costs according to table |
Assessment(1 mandag)(1 man-day) 3 Year statement
1,0 man-day Costs not yet known: until that time Euro 0.00 |
Year 2 | Experience audit(40% of complete audit) 1 Year statement
Man-days according to table (40%) with a minimum of 3 days (1.5 day per auditor) NEN costs according to table |
Check on action plan(0.5 man-days)
Preservation 3 Year statement if fulfilled 0.5 man-day Costs not yet known: until that time Euro 0.00 |
Check on action plan(0,5 man-days)
Preservation 3 Year statement if fulfilled 0.5 man-day Costs not yet known: until that time Euro 0.00 |
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Year 3 | Experience audit(40% of complete audit)
1 Year statement Man-days according to table (40%) with a minimum of 3 days (1.5 day per auditor) NEN costs according to table |
Check on action plan(0,5 man-days)
Preservation 3 Year statement if fulfilled 0.5 man-day Costs not yet known: until that time Euro 0.00 |
Check on action plan(0,5 man-days)
Preservation 3 Year statement if fulfilled 0.5 man-day Costs not yet known: until that time Euro 0.00 |
The Safety Ladder and “TenneT” products
TenneT announced at the beginning of 2017 that they would incorporate the Safety Ladder as one of the criteria in the purchasing process. In order to make the Safety Ladder applicable to all (potential) suppliers, TenneT developed, in conjunction with NEN, three different products:
The requirements that you as a (potential) supplier have to fulfil depend on the amount and level of hazardous work. Should you have any questions on the scaling, please contact TenneT.
Safety Ladder Developments
NEN new schedule manager of the Safety Ladder The next step of ProRail, after they released the certification schedule, is a transfer to a party that will further develop and manage the Safety Ladder. NEN became the owner/ manager of the Safety Ladder on the 1st of July 2016. |
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Tennet and the Safety Ladder TenneT is currently working on using the Safety Ladder as a purchasing instrument for all its contractors. |
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ProRail is considering to also apply the Safety Ladder to civil contractors ProRail is considering to also use the Safety Ladder in contracting non-recognised parties such as civil contractors. This will not be implemented before the 1st of January 2017. |
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Alliander’s Resolutions Alliander intends to incorporate the Safety Ladder in their purchasing strategy. |
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Assessed sectors Ever since the complete release of Safety Ladder on the 1st of October 2015, other companies, apart from rail companies, were also assessed on the basis of the Safety Ladder, such as companies from the construction, civil engineering infrastructure and energy sectors, etc.. |
Safety Ladder Certification by NCI
NCI was closely involved in the development of the Safety Ladder and was finally given the honour to assess ProRail according to the Safety Ladder. This was a few years ago and DAC, after it was satisfied, has been given the opportunity to assess or certify many companies such as: GVB, Van Hattum en Blankenvoort, Swietelsky, Van der Linden Onderhoud, etc.
The Dutch Accreditation Institute has been declared competent by ProRail & NEN to certify according to the Safety Performance Ladder. You can download the certifiable standard and accompanying manual here.