Trolleys, stock cages, and pallet trucks are of course extremely useful for handling large quantities of items or heavy items that could cause injuries when lifting manually, or can’t be lifted manually at all. Training, as always, should be provided to make sure that people can use equipment like this safely.
But one thing that can easily be overlooked is using equipment like this on uneven or sloped surfaces. If you have ever done this, or ever even pushed a shopping trolley down a hill or on uneven ground when it’s loaded with heavy items, it can make it much more difficult to do.
So what happens if you are injured because of using equipment like this on sloped or uneven ground? Perhaps one of the following has happened to you:
- You have injured your back or arms because of the shift in weight when using equipment on sloped or uneven surfaces
- Equipment has became too heavy on uneven or sloped ground and has caused an injury
- The equipment has rolled on to you due to slopes
- A colleague assisting you hasn’t handled the equipment properly and causes an accident / injury
Ultimately, any manual handling activities must be fully risk assessed by your employer to make sure that you can safely do it. If uneven or sloped surfaces means more people need to take part in the task, more people need to be available to assist. If this is not taken in to account, your employer may be in breach of The Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992.
Perhaps the equipment itself isn’t suitable and something powered is needed instead. The duty to assess such risks is on your employer, and any failure to do this can lead to a successful claim.
However it has happened, it is worth speaking to us about making a claim for personal injury compensation. For work accident claims, we can offer you a full No Win, No Fee service and we still offer 100% compensation agreements even though other lawyers wont due to law changes that happened in April 2013.
Your employer has a legal responsibility to have a policy of insurance that covers their employees for accidents at work.