How to check that your API 653 inspector is actually certified
It takes about two minutes, it is free, and it is the one check that decides whether the document you are buying is worth anything. Most tank owners never make it, and a surprising number of proposals do not volunteer the number.
Why the certificate is the product
An API 653 report is not a professional opinion in the ordinary sense. It is a document that exists because a certified individual signed it, and it is relied on by regulators, insurers and whoever inherits the tank after you. The examination can be performed immaculately and the report is still worth very little if the person who certified it was not currently certified when they did.
API certifications are not permanent. They run in cycles and require recertification, so the question is never whether somebody holds the certification. It is whether it is current, today, for the person whose name will appear on your report.
How to check, in four steps
1. Ask for the number and the name as API holds it
The certification number, and the individual's name spelled the way it appears on their certificate. A firm that treats this as an unusual request is telling you something. Every certified inspector has answered it many times.
2. Look the individual up in API's own directory
API publishes a Find an Inspector tool covering its Individual Certification Programs, searchable by program and country, and by state for the United States and Canada. It is the authoritative source, because it is the issuer's own record rather than anybody's copy of it.
3. Check that it is current, not merely held
Recertification is periodic. A lapsed certification is not a technicality when the report is later read by a regulator, and a name appearing in a search result is not the same as a certification being in force on the date of your inspection.
4. Confirm that this person signs your report
Then write the name into the purchase order. That single line removes the most common disappointment in this market: a report signed by somebody nobody vetted, discovered after the tank is already back in service.
The directory lives at api.org, Find an Inspector. We deliberately do not reproduce its contents here. API provides it so that employers and owners can verify inspectors directly, and a second-hand copy on a commercial site would be less current than the original and less useful than a link to it. Check the issuer's record, not somebody's transcription of it.
What the certification does not tell you
It establishes that an individual passed an examination on the standard and has kept that current. It says nothing about whether they have worked on a tank like yours, whether the firm behind them owns the equipment the scope requires, or whether the report you receive will contain what it should. Certification is the floor, not the ceiling, and the questions that sit above it are about scope and coverage.
Two of those questions matter more than the rest. What percentage of the floor will actually be scanned, and will the reading locations be marked so the next inspection can be compared to this one. Unmarked locations quietly destroy the value of everything that follows, which is covered under corrosion and NDT.
One more thing worth checking
Ask what else the firm sells. An inspector who also sells coatings or repairs has a reason to find work, and a contractor who also inspects has a reason not to find any. Neither is an accusation. It is a structure, and a tank owner is entitled to know which one they are buying from before the report is written rather than after.
What the standard governs is on the API 653 framework, what an examination without entry can and cannot reach is on external tank inspection, and what moves the total is on inspection cost.
Describe the tank and we will pass it to firms that inspect that kind
One short form. It goes to independent inspection firms working on tanks of that construction and service, and they contact you directly. Nothing on this site is inspected, scanned or certified by us.
Steel Tank Inspection is an independent reference on aboveground storage tank inspection under API 653 and STI SP001. It performs no inspections and signs no reports. It explains what an examination covers, what a compliant report has to contain, and how to verify that the inspector you are about to hire is currently certified.