Changing work patterns and the need for businesses to 'downsize' are resulting in more and more staff becoming classified as lone workers. According to the Health & Safety Executive a lone worker are those who work by themselves without close or direct supervision. They work in a wide range of professions within a number of sectors.
Most UK companies will have lone working staff and therefore a duty to ensure their safety. According to the Health & Safety Executive from the 2008/9 British Crime Survey, there were approximately 305,000 threats of violence and 321,000 physical assaults by member of the public on British workers during the 12-months prior to the interviews. This represents a worrying rising trend facing many lone workers.
Employers have responsibilities for the health, safety and welfare at work of their employees and the health and safety of those affected by the work e.g. contractors and self-employed people who companies may engage. These responsibilities cannot be negated or transferred to people who work alone. The Health and Safety Executive says: “It is the employer’s duty to assess risks to lone workers and take steps to avoid or control risk where necessary.”
The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act added another layer of liability for organisations and, importantly, managers. An employer's duty of care is not only a legal requirement but now it must be seen to be demonstrated that a company or organisation is doing everything practicable to protect the health and safety of employees. As a result many more UK businesses are adding ‘lone working’ to their risk register and taking the matter more seriously.
A lone worker should not be at more risk than any other employee and precautions should be put into place to account for normal work and foreseeable emergencies such as illness, accidents and workplace violence.
Employers should identify potential risk such as:
· Does the workplace present a special risk to the lone worker
· Is there risk of violence
· Are women staff especially at risk
· Can the lone worker summon help in the event of an emergency
Those working alone and who face a risk of violence or abuse include community based public sector staff, bus and rail staff and retail workers. Other workers such as security staff, engineers and logistics/warehouse employees may be at risk of robbery related violence or an accident. The provision of any alarming system must take these specific factors into account in order to minimise employee’s risk and business risk. However, any hardware provided needs to incorporate a wider, ongoing assessment of risk.
Lone workers by definition are more vulnerable to accident and aggression than most employees and therefore it is vitally important that their employers develop long-term strategies in order to protect their safety. Risk assessment should help decide the right level of supervision, training and protective equipment that needs to be employed.
The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (MHSW) require employers to conduct a ‘suitable and sufficient’ assessment of the risks to which employees are subjected to whilst they are at work. Any employer who has either failed to recognise a foreseeable risk or address a significant potential risk is likely to have been negligent in failing to give proper consideration to the potential risks faced by employees.
The MHSW Regulations generally oblige an employer to assess the risks of employees and make arrangements for their health and safety by effective:
· Planning
· Organisation
· Control
· Monitoring
The risks covered should, “where appropriate, include the need to protect employees from exposure to reasonably foreseeable violence”. The HSE estimates that it costs £17-19,000, on average, just to investigate a physical assault. It can take a lot less to prevent one.
Many companies have been issuing lone workers with mobile phones equipped with a speed-dial for staff to raise the alarm if threatened. A mobile phone is a communications tool; it is not necessarily an effective tool to use when faced with an aggressor or if a worker may become ‘man-down’. Arguably, by providing a worker with a mobile phone an employer increases the risks faced by the worker.
One way of protecting lone workers is through a dedicated alarm system. With the increasing number of personal attack alarms now on the market, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) has reviewed its position on their use and been instrumental in helping define British Standard BS8484 for Lone Working. BS8484 came into effect on the 30th September. It defines Lone Worker Devices (LWD) and Alarm-Receiving Centre (ARC) compliance as well as calling for sound financial grounding, secure data protection, quality training and full audit capability from the supplier of a lone worker solution. The introduction of the standard sets a benchmark against which LWDs and services can be measured. It has been driven by ACPO and the security industry to promote best practice for lone workers and to reduce the high number of false alarms being received and responded to by the emergency services.
In January, ACPO also published its updated policy document to Police forces detailing when and how the Police will get involved in responding to an alarm. Appendix V details the requirements for lone worker systems and calls for devices to be audited against BS8484 and the ARC to conform to BS5979 Cat II. The Police plan to move towards allocating a URN to a compliant ARC - without a URN it will become increasingly difficult to get a Police response. Because of this, businesses and other organisations need to treat lone worker alarm systems with the same level of importance as they do their building alarms. Ask 100 business leaders if they want to ensure the Police respond to an incident involving a lone worker and 100 will say ‘yes’.
LWDs are now specifically required to possess the functionality to initiate an audio connection to the ARC and to have the capability to automatically retry that connection until an acknowledgement is received. They must also be able to receive a discreet signal from an ARC controller to acknowledge audio connection, have the capacity to be remotely accessed by a controller and contain an automated low battery warning facility.
When considering the supply of LWDs, the standard also states that the device should, like Identicom, be capable of being discreetly activated so as not to alert an aggressor, and where a man-down sensor is fitted, must have the facility to automatically send an activation message to the ARC. Neither function is common on mobile phones.
ARCs must have the ability to locate the lone worker and obtain their position remotely in the event of an incident. The device must also enable the ARC to dial into the LWD, listen discreetly to what is happening and initiate an appropriate response should a previously raised alarm be dropped unexpectedly.
It is essential you conduct your own research on BS8484. Beware of potential misinformation from suppliers. Some may claim compliance due to the ARC element of their service being audited and approved - but not the complete solution.
Lone worker technology can play an integral part in improving the personal safety of staff but only if it is introduced as part of an overall personal safety strategy. It cannot prevent employees from facing violence or aggression, nor can it help them to deal with such situations.
Most UK companies will have lone working staff and therefore a duty to ensure their safety. According to the Health & Safety Executive from the 2008/9 British Crime Survey, there were approximately 305,000 threats of violence and 321,000 physical assaults by member of the public on British workers during the 12-months prior to the interviews. This represents a worrying rising trend facing many lone workers.
Employers have responsibilities for the health, safety and welfare at work of their employees and the health and safety of those affected by the work e.g. contractors and self-employed people who companies may engage. These responsibilities cannot be negated or transferred to people who work alone. The Health and Safety Executive says: “It is the employer’s duty to assess risks to lone workers and take steps to avoid or control risk where necessary.”
The Corporate Manslaughter and Corporate Homicide Act added another layer of liability for organisations and, importantly, managers. An employer's duty of care is not only a legal requirement but now it must be seen to be demonstrated that a company or organisation is doing everything practicable to protect the health and safety of employees. As a result many more UK businesses are adding ‘lone working’ to their risk register and taking the matter more seriously.
A lone worker should not be at more risk than any other employee and precautions should be put into place to account for normal work and foreseeable emergencies such as illness, accidents and workplace violence.
Employers should identify potential risk such as:
· Does the workplace present a special risk to the lone worker
· Is there risk of violence
· Are women staff especially at risk
· Can the lone worker summon help in the event of an emergency
Those working alone and who face a risk of violence or abuse include community based public sector staff, bus and rail staff and retail workers. Other workers such as security staff, engineers and logistics/warehouse employees may be at risk of robbery related violence or an accident. The provision of any alarming system must take these specific factors into account in order to minimise employee’s risk and business risk. However, any hardware provided needs to incorporate a wider, ongoing assessment of risk.
Lone workers by definition are more vulnerable to accident and aggression than most employees and therefore it is vitally important that their employers develop long-term strategies in order to protect their safety. Risk assessment should help decide the right level of supervision, training and protective equipment that needs to be employed.
The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 (MHSW) require employers to conduct a ‘suitable and sufficient’ assessment of the risks to which employees are subjected to whilst they are at work. Any employer who has either failed to recognise a foreseeable risk or address a significant potential risk is likely to have been negligent in failing to give proper consideration to the potential risks faced by employees.
The MHSW Regulations generally oblige an employer to assess the risks of employees and make arrangements for their health and safety by effective:
· Planning
· Organisation
· Control
· Monitoring
The risks covered should, “where appropriate, include the need to protect employees from exposure to reasonably foreseeable violence”. The HSE estimates that it costs £17-19,000, on average, just to investigate a physical assault. It can take a lot less to prevent one.
Many companies have been issuing lone workers with mobile phones equipped with a speed-dial for staff to raise the alarm if threatened. A mobile phone is a communications tool; it is not necessarily an effective tool to use when faced with an aggressor or if a worker may become ‘man-down’. Arguably, by providing a worker with a mobile phone an employer increases the risks faced by the worker.
One way of protecting lone workers is through a dedicated alarm system. With the increasing number of personal attack alarms now on the market, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) has reviewed its position on their use and been instrumental in helping define British Standard BS8484 for Lone Working. BS8484 came into effect on the 30th September. It defines Lone Worker Devices (LWD) and Alarm-Receiving Centre (ARC) compliance as well as calling for sound financial grounding, secure data protection, quality training and full audit capability from the supplier of a lone worker solution. The introduction of the standard sets a benchmark against which LWDs and services can be measured. It has been driven by ACPO and the security industry to promote best practice for lone workers and to reduce the high number of false alarms being received and responded to by the emergency services.
In January, ACPO also published its updated policy document to Police forces detailing when and how the Police will get involved in responding to an alarm. Appendix V details the requirements for lone worker systems and calls for devices to be audited against BS8484 and the ARC to conform to BS5979 Cat II. The Police plan to move towards allocating a URN to a compliant ARC - without a URN it will become increasingly difficult to get a Police response. Because of this, businesses and other organisations need to treat lone worker alarm systems with the same level of importance as they do their building alarms. Ask 100 business leaders if they want to ensure the Police respond to an incident involving a lone worker and 100 will say ‘yes’.
LWDs are now specifically required to possess the functionality to initiate an audio connection to the ARC and to have the capability to automatically retry that connection until an acknowledgement is received. They must also be able to receive a discreet signal from an ARC controller to acknowledge audio connection, have the capacity to be remotely accessed by a controller and contain an automated low battery warning facility.
When considering the supply of LWDs, the standard also states that the device should, like Identicom, be capable of being discreetly activated so as not to alert an aggressor, and where a man-down sensor is fitted, must have the facility to automatically send an activation message to the ARC. Neither function is common on mobile phones.
ARCs must have the ability to locate the lone worker and obtain their position remotely in the event of an incident. The device must also enable the ARC to dial into the LWD, listen discreetly to what is happening and initiate an appropriate response should a previously raised alarm be dropped unexpectedly.
It is essential you conduct your own research on BS8484. Beware of potential misinformation from suppliers. Some may claim compliance due to the ARC element of their service being audited and approved - but not the complete solution.
Lone worker technology can play an integral part in improving the personal safety of staff but only if it is introduced as part of an overall personal safety strategy. It cannot prevent employees from facing violence or aggression, nor can it help them to deal with such situations.
The are many worker who are working in the industries and it not possible to provide safety to all of them. It is important to use the GPS system to provide safety to the worker as it is the most important for running an industry.
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alarm for lone worker.