When a certificate approaches expiry you will be able to renew it at any time in its last year without losing the unexpired portion. For example, if you renew a certificate with 10 months life left in it, the renewed certificate will last for 5 years and 10 months from the date of renewal. Location and avoidance is another activity that does not come under the definition of street works. You therefore don’t need to hold an LA certificate to simply carry out location and avoidance of underground apparatus. (However, if you still want a card showing LA on its own, that is possible with the new style card.) 5. Renewing certificates

LA and O1 are the only two key certificates for operatives. If you are an operative, you therefore need the following to be qualified to excavate or reinstate: Table 1: operative certificate equivalents for England Certificates below(1) issued in Wales, Northern Ireland, Scotland before 4/9/17(2) and England before 6/4/17 Street works certificates continue to be technically equivalent throughout the UK. The only condition is that any non-English certificate over 5 years old has to have been renewed by reassessment (or assessment). If, after 6 April 2017, you have certificate that was renewed by simply re-registering it, it will not be valid in England. However, if you renew re-registered certificates by undergoing assessment, you will be qualified to work in England.New style cards will be as shown in Figure 1 (although in practice, there may be some minor differences). The examples shown are for someone who holds all the possible operative and/or supervisor qualifications, as appropriate. if you renew your old style certificates on a like-for-like basis, you will be reassessed in the same subjects as before For completeness, TRSG streets in any particular LHA area also appear in the LSG for that area. However, these streets may be named differently between the LSG and the TRSG -

LA - Location & avoidance of underground apparatus KEY CERTIFICATE O-series certificates, for operatives only: candidates - you can be qualified as an operative, a supervisor, or both. A supervisor qualification does not mean you are qualified to work as an operative. However, if you hold operative and supervisor qualifications, you You won’t need to be reassessed in the key certificates more than once every five years. As long as they are current, you can add as many other certificates as you like, and when you like. You can renew your certificates by undergoing reassessment but you can choose to do so by undergoing assessment if you want. The difference is as follows. Assessment is what takes place when you first obtain a certificate, and it involves a practical and theoretical assessment of your skills. Reassessment, which is intentionally less burdensome for certificate renewal purposes, involves only a theoretical assessment. However, the regulations allow you to renew a certificate by undergoing the original assessment if you choose to.

What Version

If a key certificate expires, you won’t lose the other certificates altogether - they will become valid again once the expired key certificate is renewed. These MAC/ ASC/ DBFO/ PFI contractors have authority to exercise Highways England’s legal powers and obligation under the Highways Act 1980 and New Roads & Street Works Act ( NRSWA) 1991. Only applies to certificates that have been obtained or renewed by undertaking assessment or reassessment.

It follows that an English operative will need to hold LA, O1 and O2 to be technically equivalent to holding Excavation in the highway in Wales/Northern Ireland or Excavation in the road in Scotland. You will be able to renew any certificate at any point in its lifetime. Training is not compulsory when renewing but assessment centres can provide it if you want it.

Advanced Features

Trunk Road Street Gazetteer (TRSG). This is the Highways Agency’s own gazetteer of the strategic road network. There were 16 units before - now there are 16 certificates, namely LA, O1 to O8, and S1 to S7 (the units have become individual certificates). There are 3 key certificates and the new certificate structure is as follows: Common to operatives and supervisors: there is no requirement to hold any particular combination of (non-key) certificates - you can tailor these certificates to the work you actually do

For example, a certificate in Excavation in the highway in Wales/Northern Ireland (or Excavation in the road in Scotland) will be equivalent in England to: You can also renew a certificate when it has more than a year left to go. In this case the renewed certificate will last for a fixed 6 years from the date of renewal (5 years if, for some reason, a certificate is renewed in its first year). You might want to do this if you have certificates expiring at different dates and you want to renew them all at the same time. A certificate is not valid once it has expired but it can be renewed any time up to 5 years after this date. This may be useful if you stop doing street works for a while then decide to return to the industry later. 6. Converting to the new style street works card

Changes over time for: Section 58

There is no requirement to hold any particular combination of non-key certificates. As long as you hold the key certificates, you can choose to hold as many or as few of the others as you like to suit the work that you do. For example, if you only wanted to be qualified to carry out reinstatement in hot-lay bituminous materials, you would need the two key operative certificates plus certificate O6. This principle applies similarly to supervisors. Highways England employs Managing Agent Contractors (MACs) and Asset Support Contracts (ASCs) to manage its roads, known as the strategic road network, in given geographical areas. The centre of your choice will assess you in theoretical knowledge and practical skills in your chosen subjects. You can ask for training before assessment if you want but training is not compulsory. O8 - Reinstatement of modular surfaces, concrete footways S-series certificates, for supervisors only: When serving a notice under NRSWA on Highways England as authority for the strategic road network, you must use the TRSG version of the street reference.