Columnist

How to avoid accidents in the workplace

Millions of accidents happen in the worlds workplaces each year; some due to pure accident, others due to outright negligence and many somewhere in between. Both employer and employee have to take their duties seriously when it comes to avoiding accidents.

Employees need to be fully briefed in their duties towards one another; this can involve being tidy, storing equipment away properly, cleaning up spillages and generally looking out for each other’s safety. You should log and report all accidents and be forward in asking for any protective equipment that you deem necessary – amongst a multitude of other best practices.

Similarly the employer has a distinct duty of care towards their employees. An employer should construct and define a handbook of health and safety practice and fully abide by firm health and safety rules set out in official legislation. An employee should be appointed head of health and safety, and a culture of meetings and regular inspections should be developed so as to track any developing hazards and also so staff can voice any concerns. First aiders should be clearly designated and a company should regularly communicate its commitment to health and safety. This may be through emails, literature or web based learning. The list of employer’s duties is extensive and far beyond these simple boundaries.

For a legal firm like Express Solicitors in Manchester, just under half of the claims they deal with are from injuries in the workplace, illustrating what an innocuously hazardous environment somewhere like an office can be. To avoid accidents in such an environment it’s probably useful to understand the sources and causes of most accidents – a brief and useful outline is provided on the Express Solicitors website - where it is evident things like lifting injuries, trips and falls are still all too common.

Office accidents and hazards often differ greatly from those that occur in factories so each workplace should be treated as an individual entity rather adopting one size fits all polices – although many of these are relevant across the board.

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