Fall arrest equipment only works if the people wearing it know how to fit it, use it and get a colleague down afterwards. This course covers installing and using fall arrest equipment and performing basic rescues from it. It costs R1 628 and the certificate is valid for 24 months.
Fall arrest is the system that catches someone who falls — the harness, the lanyard, the anchor point and everything that connects them. This course is about installing and using that equipment, and about performing basic rescues from it.
The rescue half is the part most sites underestimate. A worker caught in a harness partway down a structure is not safe, they are suspended, and the clock starts immediately. Getting them down is a separate skill from stopping the fall, and it needs someone on site who has practised it rather than someone reading the manual on the day.
These are two courses and two certificates, and sites that work at height usually need both covered somewhere in the team.
| Course | What it is for | Fee | Certificate |
|---|---|---|---|
| Working at Heights | Working safely where there is a risk of falling — the broad ticket for anyone going up | R1 628, 2 days | Valid 24 months, refresher R980 |
| Fall Arrest and Rescue (this course) | Installing and using fall arrest equipment, and bringing someone down from it | R1 628 | Valid 24 months |
In practice an employer puts the whole crew through working at heights and makes sure that the people who set up the anchor points, and at least one person on each shift who could be asked to perform a rescue, also hold this one.
There is no regulation that names this course. What there is sits one level up, in the Occupational Health and Safety Act 85 of 1993. Section 8 requires the employer to provide and maintain a working environment that is safe and without risk to health, and to eliminate a hazard before falling back on protective equipment. Section 13 requires the employer to give employees the information, instruction, training and supervision they need to work safely.
Read together, those two sections are why issuing a harness is not the end of the employer’s duty. Equipment nobody has been trained on is equipment, not a control.
On construction work the Construction Regulations 2014 add duties on top of the Act, and regulation 10 deals specifically with fall protection.
Full course: R1 628
Certificate validity: 24 months
Refresher: not offered on this course. When the certificate is due, it is repeated in full.
Fees on this site include VAT. A certificate is issued on completion and can be downloaded, and employers with a company account can view and verify their staff’s certificates online. Every fee is listed on the course fees page.
Individuals train at the Fundza Training Institute centre at 11 Van Riebeeck Street, Mokopane, Limpopo. We do not provide accommodation.
Companies can book a group and we train on your own site anywhere in South Africa, which for this course has the advantage that the training happens on the structures your people actually work on. Group size and travel are quoted per booking. See on-site training.
Tell us how many people work at height on your site and how your anchor points are set up, and we will quote the training.
Training for employersWork at height rarely travels alone. The certificates that usually sit alongside this one are:
R1 628 at the Mokopane centre, including VAT. For a group trained on your own site the price is quoted per booking, because it depends on how many people you need certified and where you are.
24 months. There is no shorter refresher on this course, so when it expires it is repeated in full. That is the same validity period as working at heights, so if your team holds both it is worth putting them on the same renewal cycle.
No. Working at heights is the broad ticket for anyone who works where there is a risk of falling. This course is about the fall arrest equipment itself — installing it, using it, and performing a basic rescue from it. They are separate courses with separate certificates, and most sites need both covered.
No regulation names this course. The duty comes from sections 8 and 13 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act: provide a safe working environment, and give employees the training they need to work safely. If your control for working at height is a harness, then being able to get someone out of it is part of making that control work.
Yes, anywhere in South Africa. For this course that is often the better option, because the training happens on the structures and anchor points your people use. We have run this kind of training for mines, construction companies and municipalities in most regions of the country.
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