Most sites do not fail their Legionella duties because someone refused to do a check. They fail because nobody could say, on any given Tuesday, which checks were due, who owned them, or whether last month’s were actually done. A schedule fixes that. Below is a planner you can fill in by hand today, grouped from weekly through to annual, with the record each task should leave behind.
The frequencies here are the common defaults from HSG274 and ACoP L8 [1][2]. They are a starting grid, not a national timetable — your written scheme of control and site-specific risk assessment set the real numbers for your building [3].
Why a frequency grid beats a to-do list
A flat task list treats a weekly flush and an annual calorifier inspection as equals. They are not. The value of a monitoring schedule is that it sorts every recurring duty into a band — weekly, monthly, quarterly, six-monthly, annual — so the high-frequency, high-consequence tasks surface every week and the rare ones never quietly lapse a year past their date.
The pragmatic call is to build the planner once, against your asset register, then never again rely on memory. Each row needs four things: the task, how often, who is responsible, and what gets recorded. Without that last column you have a reminder, not evidence.
The planner: every recurring task by frequency
Copy this into a spreadsheet or print it. The “record” column is what an auditor — or the next person in your job — will look for.
| Frequency | Task | Typical owner | What to record |
|---|---|---|---|
| Weekly | Flush little-used outlets to clear stagnant water [1] | On-site / FM | Date, outlet ID, who flushed, duration |
| Weekly | Visual check of any shower heads in low-use rooms | On-site | Condition, scale, descale if needed |
| Monthly | Sentinel outlet temperatures — nearest and furthest from each hot and cold source [1] | Competent person | Hot, cold and TMV-blend readings, pass/fail |
| Monthly | Rotate temperature checks across remaining outlets so all are covered over the year [1] | Competent person | Outlet ID, readings, exceptions |
| Monthly | Inspect and clean point-of-use filters where fitted | On-site | Replaced / cleaned, date |
| Quarterly | TMV inspection and fail-safe check [1] | Competent person / contractor | Pass/fail, blend temperature |
| Quarterly | Inspect cold water storage tank — visual, lid, insect screen, water clarity | Competent person | Condition, temperature, photos |
| Six-monthly | Calorifier flow and return temperatures, check for stratification | Competent person | Top/bottom temps, action taken |
| Annual | Calorifier drain-down and internal inspection for sediment [1] | Contractor | Sediment found, cleaned, photos |
| Annual | TMV service, descale and disinfect [1] | Contractor | Service certificate |
| Annual | Showerhead and hose deep clean and disinfection | Contractor / on-site | Outlets done, method |
| Annual | Review the risk assessment for changes to the system or use [3] | Duty holder | Reviewed, changes, sign-off |
| Per RA | Legionella sampling, if your risk assessment calls for it [4] | Accredited lab | Sample points, results, lab ref |
Two notes on that grid. Sampling sits outside the fixed bands deliberately — routine sampling is risk-driven, not automatic, and your assessment decides whether and where it happens [4]. And the monthly temperature rows are the engine of the whole programme; if anything slips, do not let it be those. Temperature is the cheapest, fastest signal that control is holding [5].
How to use and record it
Print the grid, or set it up so each due task generates a dated line you sign. Three habits make it stick.
Assign a single named owner per row, not a team. “Facilities” does not flush anything; a person does.
Record exceptions as loudly as passes. A blank where a reading should be reads, to an inspector, as “not done.” A logged “outlet out of service, isolated 14th” reads as control.
Close the loop on every failure. A temperature out of range is only useful if the planner forces a follow-up action with its own date and sign-off — re-test, remedial, re-check — rather than a red cell everyone scrolls past.
For the reasoning behind each frequency and how to anchor it to your assets, see Creating a site-specific Legionella monitoring plan. For the question that drives the top two bands, How often should you flush and test for Legionella? is the companion piece, and the temperature rows are unpacked in Temperature checks: the cornerstone of Legionella monitoring.
The tasks people quietly drop
These are the rows that vanish first when a site gets busy. Treat the list as a self-audit.
- Flushing during voids and holidays. Stagnation does not pause for half-term. Low-use outlets in empty wings are exactly where risk builds [6].
- The “furthest outlet” sentinel. People check the convenient tap by the door and skip the one three floors up at the end of the run — the one that actually tells you the system is hot all the way out [1].
- Calorifier base sludge. The annual drain-down gets deferred because the unit “seems fine.” Sediment at the base is a known reservoir [1].
- Recording who, not just what. A reading with no name attached cannot be questioned, defended, or trusted.
- Reviewing the schedule after a change. New tenant, repurposed room, a tap removed — the planner should change the same week, not at the next annual review [3].
Fill it in by hand, or let it schedule itself
You have a real choice here. A printed grid and a clipboard work, cost nothing, and many small sites run that way for years. The friction shows up later: transcribing readings, proving a missed week was caught, and reconstructing twelve months of paper before an audit.
A digital logbook flips the default. Tasks recur automatically by band, an overdue weekly flush flags itself instead of waiting to be noticed, temperatures are captured at the outlet, and the audit trail assembles as you go. In my view the break-even comes the moment you manage more than a handful of outlets or more than one building — the manual version scales with your patience, not your estate.
Whichever you pick, the planner is the same. Today’s concrete step: take your asset register, fill in the owner column for every row above, and find the one task with no name against it. That gap is where your next near-miss lives. L8log can then take that filled-in grid and turn each row into a recurring, self-flagging task — but the thinking has to come from you first.
A schedule is general guidance until your own risk assessment signs off the figures. The frequencies above are common expectations, not legal minimums for your site; a building with healthcare use, a spa pool, or a cooling tower may need more, and copying another premises’ intervals because the layout looks similar is how blind spots get inherited [2][3]. Set yours through a competent person against your actual system.
FAQ
Who is allowed to sign off each task on the schedule?
The person doing it must be competent for that specific task — trained, with the right equipment, and clear on the pass/fail limit [2][3]. A site caretaker can flush and take temperatures; calorifier inspections and TMV servicing usually sit with a competent contractor. What matters is that the named signatory could justify the reading if questioned.
What do we do if a weekly or monthly check gets missed?
Record the miss, complete the check as soon as possible, and note why it slipped. A single late flush is a low-level issue handled in your log; a pattern of misses on the same outlets is a finding your risk assessment review should act on. Hiding the gap is the only real failure [3].
Can one planner cover several buildings?
It can hold them, but each building needs its own asset rows and its own frequencies — driven by that site’s risk assessment, not averaged across the estate [3]. One master grid with a clear site column works; one set of figures stretched over every property does not.
Sources
[1] HSE, “Legionnaires’ disease: Technical guidance (HSG274)”. https://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/hsg274.htm [2] HSE, “Legionnaires’ disease. The control of legionella bacteria in water systems - ACoP and guidance (L8)”. https://www.hse.gov.uk/pubns/books/l8.htm [3] HSE, “Legionnaires’ disease - what you must do”. https://www.hse.gov.uk/legionnaires/what-you-must-do/index.htm [4] HSE, “Testing and monitoring your water system for legionella”. https://www.hse.gov.uk/legionnaires/testing-monitoring-water-system.htm [5] HSE, “Hot and cold water systems”. https://www.hse.gov.uk/legionnaires/hot-and-cold.htm [6] HSE, “Systems most likely to create legionella risk”. https://www.hse.gov.uk/legionnaires/risk-systems.htm