Take a look at our ten safety essentials pages. These pages will guide you through the essentials for managing health and safety in your business. The areas below contain specialist advice for you to consider when writing your risk assessments and implementing safe systems of work & procedures to keep staff and visitors safe.

When undertaking your risk assessment for your business you may wish to look at these examples to give you ideas of hazards and control measures:

Example risk assessment for an Office based business

Businesses are legally required to ensure that all employees who use display screen equipment are protected from health and safety risks. As more businesses today are making the most of using digital equipment, it is more important that ever. A lot of these devices are defined as 'digital screen equipment' or DSE. Whilst most display screens don't cause huge harm, using them wrongly can lead to future health risks. If employers don't manage DSE use, they could end up injuring people, paying fines, and causing business losses.

See our Dispaly screen equipment pages for more information 

What you must do

You must ensure that your employees and anyone else who could be affected by your work (such as visitors and members of the public), are kept safe from harm. You must assess the risk from slips and trips and take reasonable precautions.

What you should know

Slips and trips remain the single most common cause of major injury in UK workplaces.  Every year there are many accidents atre caused in office environment by people tripping over traing cables, filing cabnet drawers left open, damaged carpets or mats and slips on smooth polished floors.

See our webpages on slips, trips and falls for further information.

Employers have a legal duty to protect workers from stress at work by doing a risk assessment and acting on it, this is the same duty you have to protect people from other health and safety risks. You should use the HSE’s management standards to help manage stress at your premises. The Management Standards cover six key areas of work;

• Demands – this includes issues such as workload, work patterns and the work environment
• Control – how much say the person has in the way they do their work
• Support – this includes the encouragement, sponsorship and resources provided by the organisation, line management and colleagues
• Relationships – this includes promoting positive working to avoid conflict and dealing with unacceptable behaviour
• Role – whether people understand their role within the organisation and whether the organisation ensures that they do not have conflicting roles
• Change – how organisational change (large or small) is managed and communicated in the organisation

To effectively implement the Management Standards approach it is essential that you ensure the resource, support and infrastructure for the project is in place in your organisation. For advice on doing this go to Before you start.

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More information:

• Stress and mental health at work
• Stress risk assessment (HSE)

Many people are now work in call centres. Although the fundamental elements of a call handler’s job are the same as a typical computer-based office job, the close combination of these elements results in a unique job often of an intensive nature.

You will need to consider the following areas:

Acoustic shock

’Acoustic shock’ is a term used in connection with incidents involving exposure to short duration, high frequency, high intensity sounds through a telephone headset. Some sources suggest that these incidents are associated with a range of physiological and psychological symptoms that have been reported amongst headset wearers.

• Use headsets that protect from acoustic shock
• Ensure all incidnets are recorded accuratly
• Keep electroic copies of the incident
• Monitor the health of the exposed worker

Consultation

 

Ensure that employees are properly consulted about changes that affect their workplace, e.g. working hours, chang eof location or the introduction of new equipment.

Eyes and eyesight 

DSE work does not cause permanent damage to eyes. But long spells of DSE work can lead to:

• tired eyes
• discomfort
• temporary short-sightedness
• headaches

DSE work is visually demanding, so it can make someone aware of eyesight problems they have not noticed before (including changes in eyesight that happen with age).

Employees can help their eyes by:

• checking the screen is well positioned and properly adjusted
• making sure lighting conditions are suitable
• taking regular breaks from screen work

Hot Desking

Hot-desking (i.e. workstations are not assigned, so individuals sit at whichever desk is vacant) is now common in many typical offices and can cause stress and affect staff morale.

• Always consult staff when implementing the system, inform them what the system hopes to achieve.
• Design the system with input from the users.
• Each time a user logs on, display a short checklist on screen to prompt them to make appropriate adjustments to any of their workstation equipment as required. Allow them sufficient time to make these adjustments before they start work.
• Comprehensive staff training is essential if the arrangement is to work smoothly: rules will need to be adhered to concerning office housekeeping, including telephone and message handling.
• Allow staff to have lockers/carts to personalise their desk.
• Ensure that good hygiene policies and practices are implemented, such as providing sanitising wipes, ensuring good ventilation & air flow, don't allow employees to eat at hot desks (Provide a seperate canteeen/ break-out area), issue staff with their own headphones/ear pieces.

Violence

Call handlers may experience more verbal abuse than the typical office worker, because they spend more time on the telephone. The Health and Safety Executive's definition of work-related violence as 'any incident in which a person is abused, threatened or assaulted in circumstances relating to their work', explicitly states it includes verbal abuse. There are no clear criteria as to what constitutes an abusive call, as some call handlers may feel less threatened than others by callers shouting, swearing and making insulting and aggressive comments.

Good practice:

• Allow call handlers who have just taken an abusive call time to recover and discuss it with a colleague or their supervisor if they so choose.
• Customers who have been abusive could have this noted on their files by a warning flashing on screen when a call handler accesses their details. However, all personal information in customers' files is covered by the Data Protection laws and arrangements for using warning markers will need to be carefully defined in company policy.
• Staff must be provided with training to develop the skills needed to cope with verbal abuse.
• Management must foster an organisational culture which accepts verbal abuse as a component of violence in the workplace and an issue to be taken seriously.
•  Audits for verbal abuse could be carried out by asking staff to fill in a questionnaire every 3-6 months in order to record the prevalence and severity of verbal abuse and review strategies used to combat it.

Thermal comfort

Thermal comfort describes a person's state of mind in terms of whether they feel too hot or tool cold. It is defined as 'that condition of mind which expresses satisfaction with the thermal environment.' Environmental factors (such as humidity and sources of heat in the workplace) combine with personal factors (such as clothing and how physically demanding the work is) to influence what is called 'thermal comfort'. Thermal environment may contribute to the overall health and well-being of the employee and the well-being of the organisation. Poorly managed thermal environment may cause absenteeism, turnover of staff and complaints. If a persons thermally comfortable this can increase employee motivation, productivity and quality of output.

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• A guide to organising in calls centres - (UNISON Union)
• Advice in call centres (UNITE Union)

 

Electricity can kill or severely injure people and cause damage to property. However, employers can take simple precautions when working with or near electricity and electrical equipment to significantly reduce the risk of injury to you, your workers and others around you.

In order to comply with the law you should:

• Ensure the electrical installation is inspected and maintained in good repair; and
• Ensure that any portable appliances are inspected and tested regularly (PAT Test);
• Keep a records of inspections and tests.

See our Electrical safety page for comprehensive guidance.

The duty to manage asbestos is directed at those who manage non-domestic premises: the people with responsibility for protecting others who work in such premises, or use them in other ways, from the risks to ill health that exposure to asbestos causes.

Duty holders must:

• take reasonable steps to find out if there are materials containing asbestos in non-domestic premises, and if so, its amount, where it is and what condition it is in
• presume materials contain asbestos unless there is strong evidence that they do not
• make, and keep up-to-date, a record of the location and condition of the asbestos- containing materials - or materials which are presumed to contain asbestos
• assess the risk of anyone being exposed to fibres from the materials identified
• prepare a plan that sets out in detail how the risks from these materials will be managed
• take the necessary steps to put the plan into action
• periodically review and monitor the plan and the arrangements to act on it so that the plan remains relevant and up-to-date
• provide information on the location and condition of the materials to anyone who is liable to work on or disturb them

For further information see:

HSE - Managing Asbestos

HSE - Managing asbestos in buildings, a short guide

HSE - Managing my asbestos, a step by step guide

You will also need to ensure that you have suitable fire precautions in place;

• A guide to making your small non-domestic premises safe from fire
• Fire safety risk assessment offices and shops

Fire safety precautions are enforced by Lancashire Fire and Rescue and not the Council.