What this is
What is a pinch point?
What is a pinch point?
A pinch point is any place where two machine parts, or a machine part and a fixed object, move together closely enough to trap or crush a body part. The family includes nips between counter-rotating rollers, shear points between a moving and a stationary edge, crush points on closing platens, and draw-in points where belts run onto pulleys. This template treats all six as one survey population because a person's hand does not distinguish between them.
What is a pinch point survey?
It is a targeted inspection of one machine or line that finds and photographs every trap point on it, then asks whether each is reachable during running, cleaning, jam clearing and setting. It is narrower than a machine risk assessment: it does not cover noise, electrical or chemical hazards. Its output is a photographed list of trap points with a risk band against each, which is what a guarding project needs.
What does 'adequately guarded' mean?
It means the guard, device or distance in place prevents access to the trap point during every task in which a person is present, not just during normal running. A fixed guard removed weekly for cleaning and refitted by hand is not adequate for the cleaning task. The judgement is task-by-task, which is why this template scores reachability four times per point before it asks whether the point is guarded.
Scope
When is a pinch point survey required?
This survey is the point-finding step of the Machine Safety programme. It produces the population that guarding, interlock and risk assessment work then acts on. Using it for work a neighbouring template owns leaves you with records that will not roll up.
Use this template when
- A machine or line has reached its annual survey date under the Machine Safety programme
- Layout has changed: a conveyor rerouted, a transfer added, a machine moved into a new run
- A new or second-hand machine has been installed and is about to be released to production
- An injury, near miss or first-aid case involved a hand entering a moving part on this asset
- A guarding project needs a photographed, banded population of trap points to scope against
Do not use it for
- Machine Risk Assessment, which assesses the whole machine across its lifecycle including electrical, thermal and noise hazards, not the trap points alone.
- Guarding Verification Checklist, which confirms guards already fitted match the risk assessment and resist defeat, and assumes the points are already known.
- Interlock Function Test, which proves a specific interlock stops motion on guard opening and is a function test, not a survey.
- Conveyor and Transfer Safety Review, which covers a conveyor system end to end including loading, alignment and emergency stops.
- LOTO Periodic Inspection, which audits how energy isolation is performed and is the right home for a jam-clearing procedure failure.
Compliance mapping
Which OSHA 1910.212 requirements does this satisfy?
OSHA 1910.212 states a duty rather than a list, so the clause map runs the other way: each requirement has to be evidenced by something the survey captures. These are the fields that carry that evidence.
| Clause | Requirement | Where it lands |
|---|---|---|
| OSHA 1910.212(a)(1) | Provide guarding to protect operators and others from hazards including nip points, rotating parts and shear points | Points found |
| OSHA 1910.212(a)(3)(ii) | Guard the point of operation so no part of the body can enter the danger zone during the operating cycle | Points found |
| OSHA 1910.219(e) | Guard belt, rope and chain drives, including the draw-in points where they run onto pulleys and sprockets | Points found |
| OSHA 1910.147(a)(3) | Apply energy control where servicing or maintenance requires a person to reach into a point of operation or hazard area | Points found |
| ISO 12100:2010 clause 5.5 | Estimate risk for each hazardous situation so that controls can be prioritised | Result |
| ISO 14120:2015 clause 5 | Select guard type against the access frequency required by the task | Points found |
What it does not cover
- Safety distance calculation, which requires reach-over, reach-through and gap dimensions to ISO 13857 and cannot be derived from a photograph and a risk band.
- Guard interlock integrity, which needs a functional test and a performance-level assessment, neither of which this survey performs.
- Stopping performance, which depends on measured stop time and is the basis for positioning presence-sensing devices, not covered here at all.
- The machine's risk assessment, which this survey flags for update but does not replace; the flag without the update leaves the assessment stale on record.
- Operator competence for jam clearing, which belongs in training records and in the isolation procedure, even where this survey is what exposed the gap.
Global
Pinch Point Survey requirements by country
Guarding duties are written very differently across the three regimes most food and manufacturing operators sit under. The survey output is the same; what changes is what a regulator will ask you to produce alongside it.
29 CFR 1910.212 and 29 CFR 1910.219
A general performance duty to guard, backed by prescriptive rules for power transmission apparatus
There is no list of points to tick against. An inspector cites the unguarded point they find, and your defence is a dated survey that either identified and banded it, or did not.
Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, regulation 11
A hierarchy: fixed enclosing guards first, then other guards or devices, then jigs and protection appliances, then information and training
Recording a trap point as controlled by 'operator care' or a sign is a regulation 11 failure on its face unless you can show the higher measures were not practicable. The survey's Existing Guard Or Control field is where that argument is either made or lost.
Directive 2006/42/EC, Annex I, 1.3.7, superseded by Regulation (EU) 2023/1230
A design-stage obligation on the manufacturer, transferred to the user who modifies a machine or assembles a line
Where the survey follows a layout change joining two CE-marked machines into one line, the transfer points between them are yours, not the original manufacturer's. Those interfaces are where this survey most often finds its worst points.
How to complete it
How to complete a pinch point survey, step by step
The form fills itself in. What decides whether the record holds up afterwards is four judgements the surveyor makes on the floor, none of which are prompted by a field label.
Surveyed With An Operator scores Pass, Partial or Fail, and Partial is where the honest answer usually sits. A shift lead who has not run the line for two years shows you the documented method. The person who clears the jam at 3am shows you the shortcut. If it was the former, mark Partial rather than claiming a Pass the record cannot support.
One conveyor can be recorded as one point or as eleven. The count feeds Points Found and drives the trend line, so inconsistent grain makes the trend meaningless. The rule that works is one point per place a hand can be trapped by an independent mechanism: a drive nip and a return roller nip are two entries.
Risk Band is the field the whole survey exists to produce, and Change now is a decision to stop or restrict the machine today. The defensible test is reachability plus severity: any point failing Reachable During Normal Running and scoring Fail on Adequately Guarded is Change now, regardless of how long it has been like that. Length of tolerance is not evidence of acceptability.
Risk Assessment Needs Updating scores zero for Yes, which is correct: a survey that invalidates the assessment is a worse position than one confirming it. Answer Yes whenever a point was found that the assessment does not name, or a control it relies on turned out not to exist. Answering No to keep the score clean is the most damaging entry on this form.
What auditors find
Most common pinch point survey findings
Six findings recur across surveys of this type, in roughly this order of frequency.
| Finding | Clause | What fixes it |
|---|---|---|
| Points found only during running are recorded, and the cleaning and jam-clearing walks were never done | ISO 12100:2010 clause 5.4 | Repeat the walk during a wash-down and a simulated jam, and complete all four reachability fields on every point rather than leaving cleaning and setting blank. |
| Existing Guard Or Control reads 'training' or 'awareness' against a reachable trap point | PUWER 1998 regulation 11(2) | Record the point as inadequately guarded, band it, and raise the CAPA. Administrative control does not close a physical trap point. |
| Photographs are missing, blurred or framed too wide to show which part traps | OSHA 1910.212(a)(1) | Reshoot close, with a scale reference and the guard in its in-service position. The photograph is what an engineer scopes from months later. |
| Adequately Guarded scores Fail but no CAPA ID appears against the point | ISO 12100:2010 clause 6.1 | CAPA ID is conditional on Adequately Guarded not equalling Pass. Raise the action and enter its reference before the survey is signed, not in a later sweep. |
| Interlocked guards defeated with spare keys or taped actuators are noted as observations, not as points | ISO 14120:2015 clause 5 | Record the defeated guard as a trap point, describe the defeat in Existing Guard Or Control, and raise an interlock function test separately. |
| Highest Risk Band Found in the Result section does not reflect the worst per-point band recorded | ISO 12100:2010 clause 5.5 | Set the summary band from the worst individual point, not from an average or an impression of the line. The summary is what management reads. |
Case in point
Case in point: the transfer nobody owned
A packing hall added a short transfer conveyor to bridge two existing lines. Both machines were CE-marked and both had current risk assessments; the transfer, ninety centimetres of belt on a fabricated frame, had neither. The annual survey was done six weeks later at a shift change, with the line stopped, and returned four points, all Acceptable.
An operator lost a fingertip three months on, clearing a carton jam at the transfer while the upstream machine kept feeding. The re-survey, done running and with the operator who worked that position, found nine points on the same asset. The in-running nip between the transfer belt and the fixed deadplate scored Fail on jam clearing and Change now on risk band. It had existed since installation and had never appeared on any record.
The template
The template, field by field
The form exactly as it installs. Every field, option, score and conditional rule is editable, and the links to other templates come with it.
3 sections
- Reference
- SAF-096
- Archetype
- Inspection
- Record ID
- INSP-2026-000
- Scoring
- Count and risk band
- Direction
- High is bad
- Singleton
- No
- Basis
- OSHA 1910.212
- Links
- Links Asset; feeds CAPA
- Tags
- Machine, Inspection
- Sections
- 3
- Fields
- 35
- Follow up fields
- 4
- Repeating sections
- 1
- Links out
- 4
Header
12 fieldsSurvey ID*
Auto sequence. Format PPS-2026-0000.
The record's own ID. Other templates point at this value.
Status*
Drives who this goes to next.
- Planned2 pts
- In progress2 pts
- Complete3 pts
- Deferred0 pts
- Open0 pts
- Closed3 pts
- Overdue0 pts
Date and Time*
Completed By*
Site*
Site ID*
Format SITE-000.
Links to FDN-001 Site ID
Area*
The area within the site.
Exact Location
Drop a pin for anything hard to find.
Machine Or Line
Asset ID
Format AST-0000.
Links to FDN-002 Asset ID
Survey Trigger*
Surveyed With An Operator*
Operators know where hands actually go. Surveys done without them miss the real points.
- Pass2 pts
- Partial1 pt
- Fail0 pts
- N/Aexcluded from denominator
Points found
Repeats11 fieldsPoint Location*
Point Type*
Pinch, nip, shear, crush, draw in or entanglement.
Photograph*
Reachable During Normal Running*
- Pass2 pts
- Partial1 pt
- Fail0 pts
- N/Aexcluded from denominator
Reachable During Cleaning*
- Pass2 pts
- Partial1 pt
- Fail0 pts
- N/Aexcluded from denominator
Reachable During Jam Clearing*
- Pass2 pts
- Partial1 pt
- Fail0 pts
- N/Aexcluded from denominator
Reachable During Setting*
- Pass2 pts
- Partial1 pt
- Fail0 pts
- N/Aexcluded from denominator
Existing Guard Or Control
Adequately Guarded*
- Pass2 pts
- Partial1 pt
- Fail0 pts
- N/Aexcluded from denominator
Risk Band*
- Acceptable4 pts
- Investigate2 pts
- Change soon1 pt
- Change now0 pts
CAPA ID
Links to FDN-014 CAPA ID
Result
12 fieldsPoints Found*
Points Inadequately Guarded*
Highest Risk Band Found*
- Low5 pts
- Medium4 pts
- High2 pts
- Very high1 pt
- Extreme0 pts
Risk Assessment Needs Updating*
- No3 pts
- Yes0 pts
Risk Assessment
Risk ID
Format RSK-2026-00000.
Links to FDN-012 Risk ID
Action Required*
Raise the action record, then enter its reference here.
- No2 pts
- Yes0 pts
Priority
- High0 pts
- Medium1 pt
- Low3 pts
CAPA ID
Format CAPA-2026-00000.
Links to FDN-014 CAPA ID
Action Owner
Surveyed By*
Signature*
SAF-096 · record IDs look like INSP-2026-000 · Links Asset; feeds CAPA
Open in KnowellaRun it with agents
From a document you fill in to a programme that runs itself
The survey is a half-day walk. The part that decays is everything downstream: the CAPA that was raised but never scoped, the risk assessment flagged for update, the re-survey that should have been triggered by a layout change nobody logged as one.
Holds the surveyed points against the asset register so the population persists between annual walks, and shows which points closed, which were re-found, and which were never actioned.
Connects each inadequately guarded point to the work order that fits the guard, so a Change now band cannot sit unresolved without appearing on the maintenance backlog.
Links the jam-clearing and cleaning exposures the survey exposed to the competence records of the people who perform those tasks on that asset.
Triggers the re-survey when a modification review lands on the asset, chases open CAPA references against banded points, and holds every write for your approval before it touches a record.
This template lives in KnowSafe — safety and compliance. Incidents, hazards, permits, inspections and the critical controls behind them.
Meet KnowSafe→Glossary
Pinch Point Survey definitions and key terms
- Nip point
- The line where two rotating parts, or a rotating part and a fixed surface, converge. In-running nips draw material and hands inward and give no chance to withdraw.
- Draw-in point
- The place where a belt, chain or web runs onto a pulley or sprocket. It behaves like a nip but is often outside the guarded envelope of the machine proper.
- Shear point
- A trap formed between a moving edge and a stationary one, typical of guillotines, gates and closing side-frames.
- Reachability
- Whether a body part can arrive at the trap point during a defined task. It is task-specific, which is why the template asks four times per point.
- Risk band
- The judgement recorded against each point: Acceptable, Investigate, Change soon or Change now. Change now is a decision about today, not a queue position.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions about pinch point survey
How often should a pinch point survey be run?+
Annually as the baseline, and immediately after any layout change, machine move, guarding modification or a hand injury on the asset. A product changeover that alters how operators reach into the line counts as a layout change even when nothing was physically moved.
Can a maintenance technician run the survey instead of a supervisor?+
They can, and technicians often spot mechanical traps a supervisor misses. What cannot be dropped is the operator. The Surveyed With An Operator field is scored precisely because surveys done by engineering alone consistently under-report the cleaning and jam-clearing exposures.
What if a point is only reachable during cleaning?+
It is still a point and still gets an entry. Score Pass on Reachable During Normal Running and Fail on Reachable During Cleaning, then judge Adequately Guarded against the cleaning task. A guard removed for wash-down does not guard during wash-down.
Does this survey replace the machine risk assessment?+
No. It feeds it. The Risk Assessment Needs Updating field forces that link, and where it is answered Yes the assessment must actually be revised. A survey repeatedly flagging an update that never happens is worse than no survey: it documents known, untreated exposure.
How many points is a normal result?+
There is no normal. A single wrapping machine surveyed properly commonly yields fifteen to thirty points, and a whole line far more. Three or four points on a complex asset should be read as an incomplete walk, not a well-guarded machine.
Why does the template score counts as high is bad but risk band as high is good?+
Because they measure different things. Points Inadequately Guarded is a count, and more is worse. Risk Band is a scored judgement on the standard ladder where a better outcome carries the higher score, so it aggregates consistently with every other scored field in the library.
Keep going
Related templates and programmes
Industries this is written for
Programmes this belongs to
Used together in Machine Safety
Lockout/Tagout Procedure (Machine Specific)
Sets out exactly how to isolate a specific machine, listing every energy source and isolation point
LOTO Periodic Inspection
Checks that a specific energy control procedure is being followed correctly in practice
Machine Risk Assessment
Assesses a machine across its whole life, including setup, running, cleaning, clearing jams and maintenance
Guarding Verification Checklist
Confirms that guards fitted to a machine match the risk assessment and cannot be easily defeated
Interlock Function Test
Tests that safety interlocks stop the machine when a guard is opened, and cannot be bypassed
Robot Cell Safety Assessment
Assesses an industrial or collaborative robot cell, covering reach, speed, force limits and how people enter the space
More in Machine Safety
Machine Risk Assessment
Assesses a machine across its whole life, including setup, running, cleaning, clearing jams and maintenance
Guarding Verification Checklist
Confirms that guards fitted to a machine match the risk assessment and cannot be easily defeated
Interlock Function Test
Tests that safety interlocks stop the machine when a guard is opened, and cannot be bypassed
Robot Cell Safety Assessment
Assesses an industrial or collaborative robot cell, covering reach, speed, force limits and how people enter the space
Machine Modification Review
Reviews a proposed change to a machine before it is made, covering guarding, controls and the tasks people will do afterwards
Emergency Stop Test Record
Tests that emergency stops actually stop the machine and are reachable from where people work
Written and reviewed by
Siddarth Singh
Founder & Chief Executive Officer, Knowella
Certified Safety Professional and industrial and systems engineer with more than a decade inside food supply chain, freight and manufacturing operations. This page was written against the current text of the standards it cites, not against secondary summaries of them.
- Certified Safety Professional (CSP), Board of Certified Safety Professionals
- MBA, University of Chicago Booth School of Business
- MS and BS, The Ohio State University, Industrial and Systems Engineering
- Six Sigma Black Belt
Sources and last review. Reviewed 16 August 2026 against:
- 29 CFR 1910.212 — General requirements for all machines
- 29 CFR 1910.219 — Mechanical power-transmission apparatus
- 29 CFR 1910.147 — The control of hazardous energy (lockout/tagout)
- ISO 12100:2010 — Safety of machinery: general principles for design, risk assessment and risk reduction
- PUWER 1998 regulation 11 — Dangerous parts of machinery
This page is general guidance, not legal advice. Confirm requirements with your jurisdiction’s regulator.