By Annette Davison, Sarah Loder and Peter McLennan
As we outlined in our recent article, backflow prevention is a critical component of any water safety and hygiene strategy, especially in industrial, commercial and community facilities.
But how do you know if your system is truly effective? A structured approach using six key monitoring types—Baseline, Operational, Validation, Verification, Investigative, and Audit/Review—can help you answer the essential questions about your system’s performance and resilience.
Below, we outline each monitoring type, the questions they help address, and provide some key practical activities—so you can confidently apply them in your own context.
Type |
Question Answered |
Context |
Key Activity |
|---|---|---|---|
| Baseline | Where Are We Now? | Before you can manage risk, you need to understand what uncertainties might arise to achieving your objectives.
The baseline stage helps to set context and should involve a system survey to identify and confirm all high and medium hazard connections. This step sets the foundation for your risk management plan by mapping out potential vulnerabilities. |
Survey and classify all water connection points by hazard level. |
| Operational | Is It Working Now? | Once the system is in place, ongoing monitoring is essential.
A focus should be placed on real or near-real-time water quality monitoring at high hazard connections. This acts as an early warning system for backflow failures, allowing for rapid response. Monitoring frequency for other connection types, or in reticulation systems, should be risk-based to allow failures or near-hits, to be picked up in a timely fashion. |
Develop and implement a risk-based operational monitoring program.
Ensure continuous or periodic monitoring (in line with the speed at which the barrier could fail) of water quality at critical points. |
| Validation | Will It Work? | Validation ensures that your chosen backflow prevention methods are appropriate and effective.
This involves reviewing whether the devices or strategies have worked in similar systems or situations. Industry knowledge from colleagues can be very helpful. |
Develop a validation monitoring plan for assets based on their proven performance in comparable environments. |
| Verification | Did It Work? | Verification is about confirming that your system is performing as expected. This typically includes an annual monitoring plan, where backflow prevention devices are tested at frequencies based on their hazard rating.
Customer enquiries can also provide useful sources of data that might signal a backflow or cross connection event. |
Schedule and conduct regular testing of backflow devices and system components.
Equip customer service officers with the training and scripts they need to ask the right questions and raise early awareness of potential backflow incidents. |
| Investigative | Why Didn’t It Work? | When something goes wrong, the investigative stage helps uncover the root cause. Whether triggered by a risk assessment or a backflow incident, this phase involves a defined-duration investigation to diagnose and resolve the issue. One thing not often done well is showing evidence to close the risk loop, that the investigation was originally designed to address. | Conduct targeted investigations following incidents or anomalies and document evidence of the outcomes, including how the original event has been addressed, ideally to prevent a recurrence. |
| Audit / Review | Did My Management System Work? | Finally, a periodic audit or review helps to evaluate the overall effectiveness of your backflow management system.
This includes checking that registers are up to date, procedures are followed, and monitoring and inspections are occurring as planned. |
Design and perform structured audits to assess system integrity and compliance and ensure results are communicated to relevant personnel. |
A cycle of continuous improvement
By systematically addressing each of these six monitoring types, you will be able to build a robust and responsive backflow and cross connection management system. This framework not only helps ensure compliance and safety but also helps to create a culture of continuous improvement in water hygiene management.
Want to find out more? Check out our specialist backflow and cross-connection risk management training here: https://www.riskedge.com.au/product/aw-bfpaware-aus-01/