Video: Health and Safety Tips for a Snowy Winter

Winter can be a snowy time of year across the UK, so here are some essential safety tips from us!

Everyone loves the snow, but nothing dampens people’s love for snow like a workplace accident. You can build snowmen on the weekends but, during the week, consider some of our advice. Of course, rack safety inspections are a must and HSE racking regulations make it clear that you should have at least one SEMA racking inspection a year. Yet, there are also many other things you should look out for.

1. Keep an Eye on the Thermostat

Snow means particularly cold working conditions, especially if you’re in a warehouse. Obviously, this means wrapping up warm and encouraging your employees to do so as well. But more than that, you have a legal responsibility to keep your workplace warm. The law is not black and white about this. Rather, according to Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992, employers have a legal responsibility to keep their workplace at a “reasonable” temperature.

HSE suggests that 16 degrees is a decent minimum. However, if the work in question involves rigorous physical effort, then it recommends 13 degrees. Keeping an entire warehouse at one temperature is going to be difficult and that’s why HSE allows employers leeway. However, employers are duty-bound “to determine what reasonable comfort will be in the particular circumstances”. In other words, your employees know that your warehouse might not be the warmest place in the world, but it’s your duty to try and make things as warm as possible.

2. Slips, Trips, and Falls.

You may think of slips, trips, and falls as things that “just happen”, but HSE and the law do not agree with you. HSE strongly believes that slips, trips and falls can be prevented and, as such, you are legally required to do a number of things. All of this is especially important during a snowy winter when icy floors can make things much more dangerous.

Firstly, you have a legal duty to control slip and trip risks “as far as is reasonably practicable” according to the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 (HSW Act). Your employees also have a duty to not put themselves in danger and to use any safety equipment you may have provided for them. Secondly, the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require you assess all risks (and this includes risks relating to slips, trips, and falls) and, “where necessary, take action to address them.” Finally, according to the Workplace (Health, Safety, and Welfare) Regulations 1992, you need to keep floors in a good condition and free from obstacles or obstruction. Your employees should be able to move around freely.

That’s what the law says, but what should you actually do? Well, as far as possible, HSE recommends making sure that ice doesn’t form on your workplace floors by keeping an eye on the temperature (as mentioned before). If ice does form, HSE recommends the use of grit, arbours to cover walkways and warning cones to divert people from the ice. Be sure to put the warning cones away once the danger is gone. Otherwise, as HSE points out, your employees will learn to ignore warning cones.

Be sure to use grit properly; don’t just throw it down and hope for the best. Also remember that, while grit may melt ice, it does nothing for damp floors. For that, you need more cones and signs to divert people, as well as something to dry up the wet floor if possible. On top of all this, decent lighting is vital. Without lots of light, it’s hard for people to judge whether a floor is wet, dry, icy, or just shiny.

3. Rack Safety Inspections

We mentioned earlier that HSE recommends a SEMA racking inspection at least once a year, but there are a number or reasons why rack safety inspections are especially important during the snowy winter months.

As temperatures hit their yearly low, steel and other metals are much more likely to reach their ductile to brittle transition temperature (DBTT). This is when a metal becomes so cold that it turns brittle, rather than ductile, and winds up snapping instead of bending. For racking systems, this type of damage could lead to fatal accidents, so it’s vital to keep an eye on it during the winter.

According to the University of New South Wales in Australia, “for some steels, the transition temperature can be around 0°C”. This means that, if your warehouse has ice on the floor, it’s possible that the steel in your warehouse is turning brittle and is already significantly weaker than it would be at a warmer temperature. It is yet another reason to keep an eye on the temperature in your warehouse and yet another reason to make sure that you have a racking inspection by a SEMA approved inspector.

Be sure to keep your warehouse warm and to have rack safety inspection this winter from a SEMA approved racking inspector.

Racking Inspection Services & Other Tips for Workplace Safety in 2017

2017 has well and truly begun, so here are some top safety tips for this year.

Each new year brings its own set of challenges, and each new challenge brings its own set of dangers. That’s why we here at Storage Equipment Experts are here to give our top safety tips for the year ahead. Alongside our well-reviewed racking inspection services (which include racking inspection training and racking inspections from a SEMA approved racking inspector), there are a couple of other handy tips that we’d like to give out.

We do this because we’re passionate about safety, because we’re passionate about what we do, and because we’re passionate about businesses having a safe 2017.

Write a Health and Safety Policy for Your New Business

A new year might mean a new business venture, but as journalist David Wolinsky discovered, many new businesses don’t even realise that their startup needs a health and safety policy. When a business is small and just getting off the ground, it can be tough to consider the many, many things you need to do. However, this does not get easier. Doing many, many things is what running a company is all about: it’s called business.

With any joy, your business will grow. However, as things get faster and busier, accidents are more likely to happen. That’s why writing a health and safety policy in those early stages is vital. Writing it later on, means that you’re not only running counter to HSE’s advice, but it also means you’ll be trying to implement a health and safety policy in a business where everybody already has a set way of doing things.

By introducing your health and safety policy first, and by making it one of the first things you do in your startup, you are laying a safe foundation for all work performed afterwards. You won’t need to worry about trying to make an unsafe way of doing things safer. Instead, your way of doing things will be safe from the ground up.

Don’t Get Complacent

2016 may have been a great year for your business, and congratulations if it was. However, 2017 is not the year to get complacent. It’s never been the year to get complacent and it never will be, because complacency is what kills businesses.

Nowhere is this truer than with safety. When a business relaxes its attitude towards health and safety, that’s when accidents happen. Rather than using the successes of the last year as an excuse to relax, use them as a motivation to keep pushing forward. Last year was successful because of high standards and a relentless attitude towards improving health and safety. If this year is going to be the same, then relaxing is not the way to go.

Racking Inspection Services from Storage Equipment Experts

We offer three different kinds of racking inspection services, all of which are designed to help businesses to be safer and better.

A FREE Racking Inspection Checklist

Our racking inspection checklist remains an extremely popular racking inspection service and that’s probably because it’s so reasonably priced at £0.00. Yes, it’s free! It was written by our SEMA approved racking inspector and systematically lists which parts of a pallet rack need to be inspected. However, before using our racking inspection checklist, we recommend our pallet racking inspection training (which is run by a SEMA approved racking inspector).

Pallet Racking Inspection Training

While pallet racking inspection training is not a legal requirement (for using our checklist or for inspecting racking), we do recommend it. This is because HSE states that the regular staff inspections should be performed by someone who is “technically competent”. We believe that the best way to ensure this kind of competence is through training from a certified expert — and HSE labels SEMA approved racking inspectors as “experts”.

Racking Inspections by SEMA Approved Inspectors

Performed by the best SEMA approved racking inspector (SARI) in the country and one of the only SARIs to have also passed SEMA’s cantilever racking course, our SARI delivers racking inspections to anywhere in the UK. From our base in London, we at Storage Equipment Experts are well connected to the rest of the country. Remember that HSE also recommends a racking inspection by a SEMA approved inspector at least once a year. So what better way to get 2017 off to a good start than with a visit from us?

Contact Storage Equipment Experts today for the best racking inspection services in the UK!

Pallet Racking Safety Checklists and The Heinz #CanSong

a man and a woman performing a racking inspection

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) criticised Heinz’s #CanSong ad campaign for encouraging a lack of safety. So what can Heinz learn from pallet racking safety checklists?

Heinz’s #CanSong rang hollow with the ASA after the latter complained that the well-known baked beans company were encouraging “behaviour that could be dangerous for children to emulate” in their recent advert. The advert depicted a lot of different people using used Heinz cans and their hands to create a song. The advert even began with instructions which included taping the top of the can to avoid cutting your fingers.

Evidently, though, this recommendation was not enough to quell the ASA, who warned Heinz “to ensure that future ads did not condone or encourage behaviour that prejudiced health and safety”.

Who Are the ASA? How Can an Advert Be “Unsafe”?

While taping the edges of the can was not enough of a safety recommendation for the ASA, the real question is how and why the ASA is able to call adverts out on their levels of safety.

Firstly, the ASA is not a government organisation; it is an independent body. This independent body, however, does have the power to ban adverts, and there are good reasons for both why the ASA is an independent body and why it has the power to ban adverts.

With regards to the former, the ASA being independent means that, in theory, it is not in the pocket of any big businesses. As a result, it can make rulings against large companies (such as Heinz) without fearing repercussions. In fact, according to its own assessment, companies are happy to take on board the ASA’s recommendations, though political campaigns are another story.

So the ASA is an independent body which regulates commercial advertisements but not political ones. But why should it have the power to ban adverts? And why is it banning adverts based on health and safety concerns?

70% of the complaints that the ASA deals with are about false advertising. When a company offers a product or service at a certain price and then sell it to you a different price, they are probably breaking the law and that’s where the ASA steps in. 30% of the complaints the ASA deals with are about harm. This is why the Heinz advert got canned.

Heinz and Pallet Racking Safety Checklists

Whether or not the ASA was right to ban Heinz’s advert is a matter of debate. However, what the issue highlights is how careful businesses need to be when they hand out advice, lest that advice injures people.

Nowhere is this truer than with pallet racking safety checklists. After all, getting your finger cut on a can because of a song from an advert is one thing. Being involved in a warehouse racking collapse that happened because of a faulty racking inspection is quite another.

That’s why the quality of a racking inspection checklist is so important. If you’re told that your pallet racking safety checklist is written by an expert, then it absolutely should be. This brings us back to why the ASA is so important and why the Heinz ruling, though it may have been silly, highlights what the ASA is there for.

The ASA Means Racking Inspection Checklists You Can Trust

Thanks to the ASA, when we say that our pallet racking safety checklist is written by a SEMA approved racking inspector, you can rest assured that we’re telling the truth. The quality of our racking inspection checklist template is also under similar scrutiny, as well it should be. We are confident that, when combined with our racking inspection training, our checklist can be used to safely and accurately perform the kind of regular racking inspections that HSE recommends in its guide to warehouse safety.

We and HSE also recommend a racking inspection by a SEMA approved racking inspector at least once a year from an outside expert. This is because, as much confidence as we have in our racking inspection training and our racking inspection form, we also respect HSE’s advice. Two sets of eyes are often better than one, and an outsider is necessary to spot the dangers that you might have otherwise missed.

The ASA is there to make sure that the safety advice we offer (whether that’s through promotions of our product, for free on this blog, or as part of our racking inspection services) is up to scratch. We are confident that it is, and so are our happy customers.

Download the racking inspection checklist PDF right now from Storage Equipment Experts for free!

Racking Inspection Frequency & Cemetery Inspections: What Does “Inspection” Mean Legally?

With so much health and safety law dependent on inspections, defining it legally can literally be a matter of life and death.
An enormous part of warehouse safety is racking inspection frequency, which HSE spells out in HSG76 — Warehousing and Storage: A Guide to Health and Safety. In the guide, HSE recommends a SEMA racking inspection at least once a year. It also recommends racking inspection training so that staff can inspect a warehouse’s storage systems on a more regular basis, using a racking inspection checklist.

While all of this sounds very clear, the tragic death of Ciaran Williamson shows how one person’s definition of “inspection” can differ from another’s with terrible consequences.

“Ad Hoc Inspections” Vs. The Legal Requirement for Inspections

The sad incident occurred at a cemetery in Glasgow. While playing with his friends, a loose headstone collapsed and killed the eight-year-old Ciaran Williamson on 26th May 2015. Following his death, questions were raised about how this could have happened.

Unlike with warehouses, HSE does not spell out exactly how cemeteries should be inspected or who they should be inspected by. In fact, there is some discrepancy about the issue. This is made clear in a 2012 briefing from Parliament about unsafe headstones in cemeteries.

From this extract, it becomes clear that public opinion on who should inspect cemeteries, or whether they should be inspected at all, differs by quite some margin. However, because this is a council by council issue, public opinion is often swayed towards inspections in the face of tragedy. This is likely why, after the death of Ciaran Williamson, local councils across the whole of Scotland ended up inspecting 30,000 headstones.

The lack of clarity about who and when cemeteries should be inspected was exposed during the November 2016 trial regarding the tragedy on 26th May 2015. Mr Brown, representing Glasgow city council, was accused of misleading HSE with his definition of “inspection”.

While he claimed that the cemetery had been inspected, he conceded that it was done on an “ad hoc” basis, that there was no record, and that inspections were “a fairly unplanned activity”, despite previously telling HSE that there was a “formal process of inspection”.

Is There Any Legal Guidance on Cemetery Inspections?

Though HSE doesn’t have much to say about cemetery inspections specifically, the Local Authorities’ Cemeteries Order 1977 makes it clear that local councils are the ones responsible for maintaining safe cemeteries. In this piece of government legislation, the extent of the council’s right to maintain cemeteries is laid out in a fair amount of detail. Despite a 2004 case from a grave owner questioning local councils’ right to maintain cemeteries, the court upheld the right of all councils to do so by referring to this 1977 piece of legislation.

In 2009, probably in an attempt to make the legal situation clearer, the Ministry of Justice released its guidance on cemetery maintenance. The guidance expresses in more explicit detail councils’ right to maintain cemeteries for safety purposes. With regards to inspections, though the Ministry of Justice does recommend inspections are done as part of a regular process and that there is a record of inspections, it does not say much about what an inspection should consist of, who should perform one, or how often one should happen.

This vaguery is likely intended so that councils can make their own judgement about how best to inspect a cemetery. Much of the public’s negative attitude and concern about cemetery inspection may stem from the respect that people have of cemeteries. However, as is clear with the sad case of Ciaran Williamson, the public are also concerned about safety and aware of the dangers of uninspected cemeteries.

The problem with this vagueness is that it allows for council workers such as Mr Brown to carry on performing “ad hoc” inspections for years without anyone noticing.

Racking Inspection Frequency and Legal Requirements

All of this contrasts sharply with the recommended racking inspection frequency and legal requirements for racking inspections. As mentioned earlier, HSG76 from HSE recommends an inspection from a SEMA approved racking inspector at least once a year. They label this as an “expert” inspection. HSE also recommends racking inspections from staff using a traffic light system. They label these as “regular” inspections.

The definition of an inspection depends on the industry, as well as the government legislation and guidance surrounding it. An inspection for a cemetery simply needs to be recorded, performed regularly and done with respect for the grave owners — whereas an inspection for a warehouse is either “regular” (i.e. performed by a member of staff under HSG76 guidelines) or “expert” (i.e. performed by a SEMA approved racking inspector in accordance with SEMA guideline no. 6 – guide to the conduct of pallet racking and shelving surveys).

For an expert racking inspection, or to help your staff to perform regular racking inspections, contact Storage Equipment Experts today for racking inspection training and racking inspections from a SEMA approved racking inspector.

Make Warehouse Safety Your New Year’s Resolution

a woman in a warehouse with a clipboard conducting a racking inspection

A racking inspection form is an actionable way to make your New Year’s resolution a reality

According to the data, 92% of people fail their New Year’s resolution — and this should hardly come as surprise. Most New Year’s resolutions are either too ambitious, too vague or just don’t have the right motivations behind them.

This is where a racking inspection form comes in. Rather than having some optimistic and whimsical notion for a New Year’s resolution, a warehouse racking inspection checklist means you have something solid that you can use to achieve a measurable goal: a safer warehouse.

Beyond the temporal significance of committing to greater warehouse safety as part of a New Year’s resolution, it also makes sense from a business perspective. During Christmas, your warehouse likely went through quite the ordeal, with your racking systems clogged up with all that extra Christmas stock.

It’s entirely possible that your storage systems were damaged during the chaos of Christmas. More than that, it’s entirely possible that, while you were very careful at the time, you still managed to miss one particular piece of damaged racking. Mistakes like this shouldn’t happen, but the fact is they often do — especially during Christmas.

Racking Inspection Forms Make Warehouse Safety Consistent

A racking inspection form helps ensure that your warehouse inspections are regular and systematised. Without one, it’s easy to find yourself checking the same section of racking twice while missing another section of racking altogether.

Our warehouse racking inspection checklist is designed precisely so this doesn’t happen. By using a table that breaks down each part of a racking system, you can check every piece of each section of racking against your checklist. You can then use the checklist to note down exactly where you found each section of racking.

Doing so means you spend exactly the amount of time you need to spend inspecting your racking: no more, no less.

You Can Never Be Too Well Trained…

Our warehouse racking checklist is designed to be as user-friendly as possible. Even still, we’d highly recommend racking inspection training to help you effectively use your checklist. Our racking inspection training will give you the skills necessary to perform checks that are quicker and more accurate.

Whether it’s for just you or for your whole staff, the benefits of good training can’t be understated. It’s why business writer Obinna Ekezie believes that “your success starts with more frequent employee training.”

…And an Outsider’s Opinion Doesn’t Hurt Either!

Getting an expert from outside your business to come check your racking isn’t just a good idea; it’s recommended by HSE. Not having a SEMA approved racking inspector take a look at your racking at least once a year means running counter to HSE’s advice. According to the new CDM regulations, this means that should the worst happen and someone is injured or killed in your warehouse due to unsafe racking, you’re likely to be legally responsible.

Making sure your warehouse safety has a racking inspection by a SEMA approved inspector at least once a year (alongside regular racking inspections from trained staff, using our free racking inspection checklist) means that you have a New Year’s resolution you can keep.

Learning how to play the violin is all well and good, but this New Year, consider a practical and useful resolution that you can measure. That way, you might just wind up being one of the 8% who sticks to their New Year’s resolution in 2017.

Download our free rac king inspection form to get your 2017 off to a great start!

Video: Health and Safety Tips for a Snowy Winter