Maintaining an organised and structured workshop will enhance efficiency and significantly reduce the likelihood of accidents resulting in injury to occur.

Simple workshop guidelines must be in place and accessible for all staff and visitors, such as only authorised personnel are admitted to any area and those undertaking any task must have completed the required induction, license or certification. Good housekeeping practices such as wearing appropriate PPE, clothing and footwear must also be implemented and monitored. Further measures such as ensuring workbenches and storage racks are certified and compliant with relevant standards should also be taken to enhance workshop safety.

Certified Storage

Materials need to be stored and organised safely on-site to reduce the potential of major incidents. Unsafe and uncertified storage can lead to the overloading of equipment and materials beyond the systems weight load limit.  This presents significant risks to personnel especially when in the line-of-fire, where incidents occur as a result of falling, swinging or erecting objects. These incidents accounted for 39 fatalities and over 16% of all serious compensation claims made in 2018.

Storage racks and containers should be specifically designed for their required purpose and be certified and compliant with relevant Australian Standards. Ensuring these standards are met will decrease the amount and severity of risks present whilst increasing operational efficiency.

 

Work Benches and Stations

Cluttered and disorganised workstations are inefficient and can create safety risks. Wherever practicable, a clean-bench policy should be adopted, with all items returned to their designated storage location on completion of a task. This required suitable and sufficient shelves, cupboards, wall hangings and space to be available. Bend-tech offers a variety of certified work benches and stations suited for both general and more specific purposes.

Organised and Tidy Workplace

Protocols must be in place to ensure working conditions are maintained to a high standard. Every workstation should be well lit, kept extremely clean and have constant airflow. Fire extinguishers and relevant signage must also be present.

Certified storage and workstations will help decrease clutter that may be potentially hazardous. 23% of all serious compensation claims, nearing 25 thousand people, was associated with falls, trips and slips of a person. Although many claims may be accidental, a significant number of incidents could be avoided by the implementation of an organised and structured workshop.

If you would like more information on the benefits certification and compliance with Australian Standards will have on your site, download our free whitepaper, 10 Valuable Benefits Certification & Compliance Can Add to Your Site.

 

Source: Safe Work Australia

Tags: , , , , ,