The most common injuries that take place within an office environment are associated with ergonomics (referring to the science of equipment design). Due to the fact that the majority of an office worker’s time is spent sat at a desk while working on a computer, this exposes them to a higher risk of strains and other injuries concerned with posture and repetitive movement. There are a number of things you can do to try and reduce this.
Provide adjustable equipment
An office is the perfect example of a situation where one size definitely does not fit all. Everybody is different and therefore it is important to provide chairs, work surfaces, monitor stands etc that are adjustable to accommodate everyone. It is also important to source the furniture and equipment from a reputable company where you can be sure it is regulated and has passed numerous safety tests, for example by purchasing your office furniture in Manchester rather than from other countries where it may not be regulated.
Train workers how to use equipment
Once you have all of the correct furniture and equipment installed, it is your duty to ensure that the employees are also properly educated on the risks and trained to use the equipment effectively. You should make sure they are firstly aware of the correct way to set up their work station, the damage that could be caused if this isn’t carried out, and then how to use and adjust the furniture provided to achieve this.
Provide document holders
When copying from a hard copy, constantly switching position from looking down at the desk to up at the computer screen can lead to neck strain. A document holder that holds the hard copy up at eye level next to the computer screen will eliminate the risk of neck strain. It will also be beneficial of your eyes as they will no longer have to constantly change focus as you swap from the document to the monitor. It is also advised that employee’s feet are able to firmly touch the floor when seated, and the mouse always be placed level with the keyboard.
Healthy and safety in the office is essential as it concerns the welfare of employees, employers, and anybody else who enters the workplace from customers to the post man. There are a number of inevitable hazards within an office environment and accidents do happen. However, as an employer it is your duty to make sure you are aware of these hazards, and have put every possible measure in place to minimise the risks.
Safety Precautions to Take When Working with Electronic Equipment
Safety Can be Confusing
When working with or testing any electronic equipment, it’s always important to be cautious. Whatever type of equipment you’re handling, whether simple or complex, it’s important to take the right safety precautions.
Working with electricity comes with huge risks that should never be taken lightly. If you’re a hobbyist who loves working with electronic components or an electronics professional at your workplace, safety should always come first.
To avoid personal injury, possible damage to equipment or danger of fire, all work on electronic equipment should be conducted following these safety procedures.
General Safety
Before working on any electronics, consider following these basic safety precautions to help reduce any hazards.
•Remove any electronic equipment you’re testing or working on from the power source.
•Never assume the power circuit is off. Test and test again with a voltmeter to confirm.
•Remove fuses and replace them only after the power to the circuit is disconnected.
•Don’t connect power to a circuit until you’re done working on it and rechecked the work.
•Always ensure that all electronics equipment is properly grounded
•If it’s damaged, replace it. For instance, replace cables instead of repairing with insulating tape.
•Always use the right electronics repair and maintenance tools.
•Always return covers after removing them to reduce the risk of electric shock.
•Make sure your circuit is not overloaded.
•Always have safety equipment like a fire extinguisher, a basic first aid kit and a mobile phone nearby.
•Don’t wear flapping or loose clothing when working.
•Don’t work with metallic jewelry on your hands like watches, rings and bracelets.
•Don’t use bare hands to remove hot parts.
•Always wear non-conductive shoes.
•Always wear insulator gloves in your hands when carrying out repairs.
•When removing high-voltage charges on capacitors, always use a shorting stick.
•Don’t hold the test prods when measuring voltage over 300V.
•Always remove power to a circuit before connecting alligator clips.
•Always wear safety goggles.
•Be careful when handling large capacitors as they can still hold high voltage even after you’ve disconnected the circuit from power.
High Voltage Safety
One mistake that electronics experts make when doing repairs or maintenance work is assuming routine safety procedures after getting all too familiar with their work. It’s important to know that most electronic equipment use high-voltage that is dangerous and can be fatal. Always follow these safety precautions when working on or near high-voltage circuits.
•Don’t work on electronic equipment or make repairs with high voltage on.
•Don’t take chances doing what you’re not sure about.
•Consider using an isolation transformer when working on AC powered electronic circuits or equipment.
•Never tamper with interlocks.
•Don’t ground yourself: Make it a practice to use only one hand when connecting equipment to an electronic circuit.
Fire Safety Precautions
When working with electronic equipment, there is often a risk of fire caused by a short circuit or other reason. Follow these precautionary steps:
•Avoid anything that would cause a fire around your working area like paper, cloth or other combustible materials.
•Look out for damaged wire insulation, overheating of electronic equipment, damaged circuit boards and corrosive components like batteries.
•If there is a burning smell on your electronic equipment, disconnect the power source.
•If there is a fire, use a nonconducting dry powder or CO2 fire extinguisher.
•Always check your circuit to be sure that everything is okay after repairs or maintenance before connecting power.
Electric Shock
One of the major hazards when working with electronic equipment is electric shock. To avoid this, you should take a few safety precautions, including:
•Always read safety procedures that come with every electronic equipment you’re about to test or work on.
•Recheck all wires for bad connections
•Always make sure that all parts of electronic equipment are well-mounted to prevent accidents.
•Keep electronic equipment away from water and other liquids
•Always check for signs of wear, defects and fraying on electronic equipment cables, cords and connectors.
•Use special safety rubber gloves and shoes.
Testing Equipment
With the increasing use of electronics in homes and workplaces, safety is becoming more and more important to consumers and service experts. If you’re an electronics expert offering repair and maintenance services, it’s important to invest in the right new or used testing equipment for your work—that ensures that you’re able to carry out your job safely.
Author Bio:
Arnold Sharpe is a freelance writer and an electronics expert working with the leading electronic testing equipment store in Los Angeles, CA. He reviews the latest home and office electronic equipment in the market.
Check These Things before Letting Tradesmen Walk into Your House
The old saying “Buyer beware!” is important to remember when you need work done in your home. You are the one responsible for vetting, hiring and making sure you get a quality product or service before you’ve paid your bill. Contractors who do work on your home can put a lien on it if you don’t pay the bill, so the best option is to try to make sure the person you hire is going to do what you’ve asked them to do in the time you’ve allotted for the job. If you’re not sure how to properly screen tradesmen that walk through your door, read up on these five ways to get started before you’ve signed the actual contract.
5 Ways to Screen and Vet Tradesmen
When you need to call a commercial plumber in Sydneyright away, you should already have someone in mind who you’ve screened ahead of time. Any professional that will be doing work in your home should go through a careful screening process, which takes time. Thus, get those contact numbers ahead of time by checking out your local tradesmen before you actually have an emergency. You need to find out:
1. If They’re Insured – People who work in your home can also cause fires, have an accident, or just do damage to the home during the course of their work. It doesn’t matter if you are having a roof replaced or your windows cleaned. You need to be sure they have their own insurance that covers them as well as any damage to the property, in case that happens. You don’t want to be stuck for the bill for something that was not under your control.
2. Referrals – Check out local referrals from your neighbors and even third party online sites that deal with tradesmen in your area. Local reviews on online forums can help you decide ahead of time whether someone has good customer service, how they deal with the public, and the quality of their work. It also lets you know if you can trust them or not.
3. Get a Contract – If you have a lawyer, have them review it. If not, read carefully to know ahead of time what you will be signing and how it obligates you to pay, whether the work is done shoddily or late. You should have some way to get out of a contract where the tradesmen do not hold up their end of the bargain. The contract will also indicate any liens that might go on the house to secure payment for the work done.
4. Professional Reputation – Is this tradesman in good standing with their certifying organization? How long have they been in business? You don’t want to just hire someone who is off the street, or new, who can’t prove they know what they’re doing. They should have some sort of certifying paperwork or be a member of a professional organization within their trade.
5. Their Payment Policies – Tradesman differ in how they accept payment. Some will accept half before they start a job and half on completion. Others wait until the job is fully done to take payment. Some take some form of credit, but not all. Some will offer discounts for new customers or those that have given them a paid referral. You can even get a bulk deal for a year-round attention to the home, as a maintenance package, that you either pay monthly or yearly.
Six Advantages to Manual Handling Training for Employees
Manual Handling Training looks to ‘prevent’ workplace injuries that can be endured when competing tasks such as Manual Handling. Using method ‘prevention is better than cure’, we will outline 6 better ways of Manual Handling that will improve your employee’s knowledge, training and experience of good safe practice within the workplace. This will help to reduce and hopefully prevent any further injuries as a result of poor Manual Handling training.
To learn from the following 6 benefits to manual handling training for your employees; sit-up straight, make sure your back is stretched and the lights in your room are lit well enough for reading. Once you have completed those steps, please begin the 6 advantages to Manual Handling Training for Employees:
1) Raises Awareness
One of the biggest mistakes that an individual tasked with manual handling tasks make is to have a poor awareness of the risks associated to manual handling and the injuries that they may incur as a result of poor form and practice.
Manual Handling Training will raise awareness to your employees to the possible risks and dangers directly related to Manual Handling, heightening the importance of good practice within your employees and bettering their understanding of the potential outcomes if practices are ignored and Manual Handling techniques are not employed. Raising Awareness is not a stand-alone practice that will ensure good Manual Handling practice is met and implemented within their work, regularly!
2) Good Practice
An excellent outcome of Manual Handling Training is the understanding and learning of form and good practice. Manual Handling instructors will provide employees with the knowledge of best, safe and most effective practice. By understanding the best method to carry out Manual Handling, employees should understand the opposites; bad practice.
By teaching an understanding of the differences of good and bad Manual Handling, employees may be able to start implementing good practice techniques within their own work.
3) Employees in their Environment
One of the most valuable Manual Handling Training practices is to host the course on-site, within the environment employees will be using their training on a daily/ frequent basis. This method helps to cement the knowledge accrued within their own working environment rather than needing to ‘mentally’ envisage using the taught Manual Handling techniques at their own workplace (which may not have an identical layout, many variables can enter the training process etc.)
4) Teaching Employees How to Use Mechanical Aids
An extremely positive outcome of Manual Handling Training courses on-site is to enable the instructor to show the intended and correct use of Mechanical Aids within their own working environment to ensure employee safety when using such machines. Typically, employees using mechanical aids will have already been briefed and understood the additional safety requirements necessary to operating those particular machines.
By teaching employees on-site, best practice techniques can be ensured to be passed on and understood. Teaching employees within their own environment has an instrumental impact on the effectiveness of Manual Handling Training for employees, this is heighten when Mechinical Aids are involved within the process.
5) Learning through Experience
For employees, learning through experience in their workplace may be a critical aspect to bettering their understanding of the best work practices/ techniques within their own work environment – improving confidence.
Due to the inclusiveness of learning from experience, many employees may be able to provide insight into their past methods and techniques which have now been corrected. This level of teaching may be highly beneficial to individuals.
In addition, employees that have picked up and developed bad habits which are translating into their daily work practices have a chance to ‘refresh’ their understanding in a learning environment with an expert which should help to improve their abilities to fulfil the role and improve the safety of their work.
6) Promotes a Healthy Workforce
One of the most under-estimated benefits from Manual Handling Training for Employees is the promotion of a safer, healthier and happier workforce with a greater understanding of the roles and jobs they are to fulfil.
It has been widely cited that a healthy workforce has benefits on productivity. Manual Handling Training promotes this by teaching good, efficient and safe practice within the workplace.
For your business to benefit from Manual Handling Training, please visit our website at www.ofi.co.uk.
The workplace isn’t the only place where you should strive for safety. The roadways can be equally as dangerous and an accident before work can start you off on the wrong foot. If you are like millions of other drivers, commuting may be one of your least favorite parts of the day and for good reason, according to the Texas Transportation Institute (TTI), a division of Texas A&M University, the average commuter spends about 42 hours a year in traffic congestion.
Not only can traffic congestion cause major headaches and stress, it is also a contributing factor in accidents across the U.S. Texas, alone, is notorious for some serious traffic jams. Here are some tips to having a safer commute and ways to prepare for your morning drive before you even hit the road:
Get Enough Sleep
Sleep can be hard to come by, particularly when you’re putting in overtime and trying to balance a life outside of work. A good night’s sleep is essential to physical and mental health, productivity and safety at work as well as safety on the road. The National Sleep Foundation (NSF) recommends that adults get between 7 and 9 hours of sleep at night. Additionally, NSF also reports that at least 100,000 crashes occur each year due to sleep deprived drivers. Do yourself a favor and get enough sleep, even it means skipping the nightly news report or chatting with friends on social media. Prep for the Day the Night Before
Remember how Mom used to urge you to set out your clothes for school, the night before? It’s not a bad idea. The more prepared you are for your day, the better. If your morning is full of too much to do before you even get behind the wheel, you may leave the house stressed out, running late, and as a result, you may drive more recklessly thus increasing your risk of an accident.
Relax
Some drivers really hate commuting. It can be stressful, it can cause anxiety, and it can cause rage. If you get in the habit of relaxing before you leave for work, you may be and feel ready to face morning gridlock. While a relaxing bubble bath may be out of the question, some yoga poses or even brief meditation could put you at ease, making you more focused and less likely to lose your cool while driving. Relaxing exercises not your thing? Consider going for a brisk walk, a short run, or even hit the gym before work, it may have the same benefits.
Check Out The Traffic Beforehand
For many commuters, traffic is traffic, but sometimes taking a look at the traffic before you head out the door can help you prepare for what you can expect or what you may want to avoid. Check out traffic cams or download an app like Waze to get an up-to-date look at the roads and any delays due to accidents or construction. It’s always a good idea to check the weather forecast, too, as a rainy morning in Texas can make for a nightmarish commute. Preparedness may not always reduce the hassles of a morning commute, but it can help you stay safer.
Purchasing a locker for your office means you need to be well-informed before you make a buying decision. Depending on your requirements, you can customise your office’s locker system as well as select the accessories that will enhance it. The most important consideration you need to make is how many tiers you will need. This one variable will assist you in quickly determining what characteristics will work for your storage and security needs. Always double-check the dimensions and description for verification as well.
Handle Types You also have to consider the handle type. Locker systems are featured with a lift handle, door pull or recessed handle design. Lift handles supply the user with fast and convenient access to the items or content within a locker. This kind of handle makes it easy to add a padlock for securing the handle and preventing any kind of access that is unauthorised.
Recessed handles are designed to keep vandals from striking the handle component in order to obtain access. Door pull handles, like lift handles, provide an easy way to affix a padlock. Most of the box lockers that are sold feature a door pull handle design. Now that you have become acquainted with the three main handle designs, you need to think how the locker will be used, the style of locker you will need and the size and colour options.
Compartment Storage Lockers For instance, compartment storage lockers are ideal to choose when you need to store and safely secure personal items or equipment. These types of lockers come with either latch-fitted or key-operated locks. The lockers are good for storing equipment when you are not using it. Niche Type Storage and Security Other locker storage solutions for the office include the post locker, which is made to safely store snail mail. and the laptop, which enables an employee to store his laptop or laptop accessories. You can also use headset lockers that are available for storing headsets.
Laptop Storage The laptop storage lockers that are used provide a cost-efficient way to store laptops. The lockers come fitted with either latch or key-operated locks. You can choose a separate frame and door colour or keep the frame and door color the same. Usually, the frame on this sort of locker is grey whilst the door may be grey, red or blue.
Headset Lockers Another storage option – a headset locker – is usually divided equally among sixteen compartments. Typically, the lockers are offered in one size and each of the compartments feature a standard key-operated lock.
Quality Features Any locker you choose should offer an air vent system on the door, a welded front frame, through frame locking, welded internal door strengthener and knuckle hinges. The locker should feature, as standard, an anti-bacterial powder coating as well. Using this type of coating prevents the spread of MRSA and E-coli bacteria at bay. MRSA stands for Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, which causes different infections in the body. The office locker you choose should be quality engineered so it will supply a dependable and sturdy storage and locker system for many years. Any built-in security adds extra confidence that office electronics and personal items will not be stolen or seized. Make sure the office locker you select offers replacement keys or locks, if necessary too. Numbered cards that show locker numbers are usually available.
You can get a better idea of the various locker styles by visiting such sites as locker-selector.co.uk. When you have this kind of reference, you can better visualise how a locker system can be incorporated into your office environment.
Fire safety training is essential to know especially when you review the recent statistics concerning fire.
Some Important Fire-related Statistics
Over the span of a year, from 2011 to 2012, local rescue services in Britain were called out to almost 585,000 fires or false alarms. Of these call-outs, approximately 272,000 were for actual fires whilst 312,000 were false alarms. Of the 70,000 building fires reported, approximately 44,000 took place in private dwellings. Of the primary fires recorded, around 6,000 took place in dwellings whilst 7,300 happened in other structures. About 14,000 of the fires involved a fire in a car.
When you review the above statistics, fire safety training is not the kind of knowledge you can blithely sweep under a rug or scan over randomly. In order to reduce any risk of liability and ensure the safety of household members or employees, you need to take fire safety training yourself or offer the a course or program to people in the workplace. By taking this approach, you not only reduce your costs for liability cover, you will also establish a safer working environment for your employees and yourself.
Fire Awareness Education
Fire safety trainers today feature courses that are highly interactive as they provide fire simulation equipment that mimics emergency occurrences. These hands-on courses give participants the confidence they need to handle certain fire-related events. Fire demos are featured by trainers that allow participants to hone their skills using a fire extinguisher as well.
Legally, employers are obligated under the Fire Safety Order or Regulatory Reform of 2005 to make sure that fire safety training requirements are met. To make scheduling easier, safety trainers can come to your work site. Therefore, there is no practical reason why you cannot provide fire safety training to your staff.
Types of Fire Safety Training for Employees
Staff members can take one of various fire-related courses, including – • Fire extinguisher maintenance • Fire extinguisher maintenance (refresher course) • Practical fire extinguisher course work • Fire warden training • Fire safety awareness
A fire safety awareness course usually lasts about two hours and combines practical sessions with theoretical learning. This educational format permits staff members to learn how to respond efficiently in a fire emergency. Delegates taking the course normally receive a comprehensive manual and a certificate.
Class Participation/Interaction: What is Involved
Participants are given the chance to use a fire extinguisher to control a live fire using a fire-friendly simulation apparatus. Therefore, a fire safety awareness course is important as it not only assists employees in handling a fire emergency, it also ensures that your company remains compliant with the relevant and local health, fire and safety laws. In fact, the course includes a section that covers fire legislation. Not only that, students learn proper evacuation procedures, review the common causes of a fire, and learn about various fire extinguishers and their uses.
Some of the causes of a fire relate to flammable liquids, faulty wiring, lighting fixtures and heat sources. For instance, it is important to have the wiring in your business regularly checked. Double adaptors and power-boards can both overload power points. Make sure the correct fuses and safety switches are installed and used as well.
You can obtain the above-described fire safety training by contacting companies, such as ifast in the UK. Use a provider that will continually work with you to raise an awareness among your staff about the importance of safety and security. Stay safe and work safe by arranging for training today.
At the tail end of last year, the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Occupational Safety and Health called for urgent action to be taken to tackle the legacy of asbestos in Britain’s workplaces. Building occupants may be exposed to asbestos, but those most at risk are persons who purposely disturb materials and they become airborne such as maintenance or construction workers. This often leads to mesothelioma – an incurable disease of the lungs which is fatal.
With an estimated 5000 people dying as a result of asbestosis and mesothelioma every year, and a vast majority of these deaths coming as a result of exposure just decades ago, the All-Party Parliamentary Group argued that it is wrongly seen as an issue of the past as the use of the material has been banned since 1999. However, they believe the time has come to put regulations in place that will lead to the safe removal of all asbestos that is still in use in buildings throughout the UK. This is to ensure that future generations do not suffer the same asbestos-related deaths which have blighted the workforce of the 1950s, 60s, 70s and 80s.
But is this proposed asbestos eradication realistic? While asbestos is still around us and can be found across both domestic and non-domestic premises, people are still knowingly being exposed to asbestos whether they’re working in maintenance, refurbishment or demolition. In their report, the group have called for:
• Commercial, public, and rented domestic premises should have to conduct a survey to indicate whether asbestos is present in the building, registering the results with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). • If asbestos is identified, any refurbishment or repair to the building should include its removal. • The HSE must develop a programme of workplace inspections to ensure asbestos material is identified, marked and managed and that eradication plans are in place with a projected timetable.
Ian Lavery, chair of the all-party group said: “We believe that the Government needs to start now on developing a programme to ensure that asbestos is safely removed from every workplace and public place so that we can end, once and for all this dreadful legacy which has killed so many people, and will continue to kill until asbestos is eradicated.”
Whether asbestos eradication is realistic or not, it always helps to be fully informed on an issue that remains prominent in the public conscience. If you’re unsure of the impact asbestos may have on your property or business, Praxis42 are available to offer eLearning and consultancy to suit your needs. Our Asbestos Condition Surveys are provided as part of an estate and facilities risk management service, whereas our Asbestos Awareness eLearning course aims to help organisations meet their legal obligation to train employees whose work could lead to exposure to asbestos containing materials.
It goes without saying that construction companies need to look for enough safety gear to cover their workforce. While crews should be provided the proper work vests, boots and helmets, there are other concerns that businesses may overlook. In a recent article for Construction Citizen, Jim Kollaer of Kollaer Advisors describes a possible problem he witnessed in a construction team in Houston, Texas.
Kollaer said that he saw a team heading to a hot mix job. Though the workers were all wearing the right protective gear, the driver—possibly an owner of the company—didn’t have a helmet on and seemed unprepared. When Kollaer told the crew about this, his concerns were dismissed. All the same, it shows the possible safety gaps that can arise on a work site, even if companies are trying to keep everyone wearing the right equipment.
Following OSHA guidelines can help companies keep everyone protected at the same degree. A fact sheet from the organization notes that employers should go beyond simply acquiring the right equipment, and also train workers to wear and maintain this gear correctly.
According to this source, hard hats are useful for protecting against penetration and electrical injuries as well as dangers from falling objects. It’s also the employer’s responsibility to communicate with workers and let them know which equipment is necessary.
This includes not just headwear but other forms of protection, such as hand, foot and face guards. By creating a strong safety culture, companies could also train their workers to respond when they see bad behavior.
Purchasing team hard hats all at once is the first step to a safer workplace, but it’s also a point where some companies make mistakes. Cover everyone who will be on site with the equipment available from Texas America Safety Company
As more and more devices become “wired,” it seems that every profession is set to accommodate more data access. Google Glass was one example of a data interface with possible worksite applications, and Sourceable recently commented on another way that this could come to the construction industry: “smart” hard hats. This would involve putting sensors inside a worker’s helmet to address potential safety concerns.
One way this could work is by transmitting health information live from a worker to others, encouraging proper treatment and response when something bad threatens a worker. Eventually, this information could help predictive analytics foresee possible trends and work around them as well.
Dr. Rod Shepard of Laing O’Rourke said that his company’s plan for a more predictive approach to injury prevention “looks more at big data collecting information over a period of time” before working that into future plans. “It may be that we have a couple of alert scenarios over several months, but really the huge advantage can be gained long term in guiding how we do things day to day,” he added.
In an article for City A.M., Alastair Sorbie of IFS examined the ways that “disruptive technology” have already entered into construction. These include digital modeling tools that can help construction efforts avoid problems and ensure a safer work site.
Sorbie does note that implementing more technology in this sector will require workers with the skills to use it, which will be especially important in attracting future employees. In this way, the issue of using tech to encourage safety touches on other important trends impacting construction, at least in the U.K.
For more about hardhats and other necessary construction safety gear, contact Texas America Safety Company. We have supplies for many different work situations and weather conditions.
CATEGORIES
Head Protective Gear
Your online resource for safety information, safety tips, and safety compliance
