There are loads of different workplace rules and regulations that your employer is legally bound to follow. There are so many in order to fulfil their purpose of protecting employees in the workplace. It is the responsibility of your employer to take all the necessary actions to ensure these rules and regulations are upheld; this is achieved in several ways, namely the two most common methods:
- Risk Assessments
- Training
Risk Assessments
Any activity, task, premises, and location should be reasonably risk assessed when it is practical to do so. Your workplace itself must be thoroughly risk assessed to ensure there are no defects or hazards that could end up injuring you in the workplace. For example, all walkways and traffic routes should be free from tripping hazards or articles that could cause an employee to slip, trip, or fall. Regular inspections and maintenance regimes should be in place to ensure this is upheld. It’s really quite simple to ensure the workplace is as safe as possible from potentially dangerous working practices, such as those involving manual handling, machinery and equipment, or any task that involves the use of personal protective equipment, should be thoroughly and comprehensively risk assessed.
Manual handling activities should be risk assessed to ensure that the employees involved in the task are more than capable and able to lift the loads safely. The loads should not breach a particular weight dependant on who many are lifting the loads, and the task itself should be able to be carried out without hindrance.
Realistically, with manual handling activities, the use of mechanical assistance should always be explored to limit the amount of manual handling that actually needs to take place.
For work equipment, machinery should be assessed to ensure it cannot cause any harm to the user. Appropriate guards and emergency stop buttons should be in place to prevent the user from ever coming to harm. The use of risk assessments is the procedure to take to pick up on these potential dangers, and rectify as necessary.
Any activities that involve the use of personal protective equipment should be assessed to make sure the right equipment is being used, and that the equipment will do the job of protecting you from coming to any harm.
However, as I said earlier, it’s not just risk assessments that play a huge part in making sure your workplace is as safe as is reasonably and practicably possible.
Training
In essence, a great deal of risk assessments and measures that are put in to place mean absolutely nothing if the staff are not trained at all. Risk assessing a manual handling activity, and identifying what needs to be done and how, is nothing unless you actually train those taking part in the tasks in what to do and how to do it safely. Being provided personal protective equipment means absolutely nothing if you don’t know how to use it. This goes for actual work equipment as well.
Thorough training is the means by which your employers can ensure you know how to perform a particular task safely, and the risk assessments are done to identify any potential risks that need to be addressed. They are two very simple things – although they need to be closely regulated with frequent risk assessments and re-training to ensure the workplace is always as safe as possible.
Making a Claim
So, what happens if you end up injured at work whilst in the line of duty? Well, dependant on the circumstances of how you were injured, you may have a claim for compensation. It takes an independent firm of specialist personal injury lawyers to thoroughly advise you and represent you if we think you have a claim.
We will investigate with your employers, usually through their insurers (they are legally obliged to have a policy of Employers Liability Insurance in place), to ascertain whether any breach of the important duty of care they have for you has taken place. If it has, we will ensure to access the compensation you are legally entitled to have.
If your employers have failed to risk assess a particular task or area of your workplace, of if they have failed to adequately train you, and you have ended up injured as a result, it’s highly likely that you have a successful claim for compensation. Get in touch with us and we will see how we can help you out.
Our Genuine No Win, No Fee means that you will always receive 100% of your compensation payout because your employers insurance actually covers your legal fees for making as claim as well.
