Now that you are the proud owner of a new piece of work equipment, it is imperative that you know how to use it correctly in order to avoid any serious injury. Every year there are numerous accidents due to the misuse of machinery and work equipment some of which are fatal. It is not always appreciated that an accident within the workplace can cost the organisation dearly due to the fact that additional cover will be needed to undertake the work normally carried out by the injured party, as well as the fact that insurance premiums could be increased along with the possibility of legal prosecution and civil claims. It is therefore vital that organisations only permit adequately trained staff to use safe well-maintained equipment.

Work equipment can often be described as any piece of machinery, tool or item used within the working environment; it can be as simple as a chair in the office through to a company car or a complex vehicle tail lift or some other piece of machinery. All work equipment is covered by the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 and this piece of legislation requires employers to undertake specific actions. These regulations also apply to organisations that permit employees to use their own tools and work equipment for tasks on their behalf. Therefore it will be important to ensure all equipment is suitably checked.

The first thing to do with any new piece of equipment is to decide if it is suitable for the task that you require it to perform as many accidents occur because people do not choose the right equipment/tool for the task being undertaken. When you are satisfied, identify what and how it can cause any risks to the health and safety of users and what needs to be done to prevent or reduce the risks. This should be done in the form of a risk assessment.
When identifying risks it will be important to consider: -

• Who and how the equipment will be used including inexperienced workers some of who may have language difficulties or may have difficulties in reading or writing.
• Young persons who may be required to use the equipment may be inexperienced or lack knowledge of existing or potential risks.
• Employees who may act carelessly or are likely to make errors of judgments.
• Whether guards and safety devices are poorly designed or inconvenient to use as this may result in the safety device being defeated.
• The different types of power supplies required to operate the equipment such as mains electric, battery, hydraulic, etc.

When you are satisfied that the assessment identifies all the hazards associated with the machine and that the machinery is safe for use, it will be important to ensure that all operators are suitably trained and hold the correct knowledge on how they need to use the equipment safely. On occasions the supplier of the apparatus may undertake this training when the machinery/equipment is provided to the organisation, either on your premises or in another suitable training centre. On other occasions suitably competent members of staff could undertake the training if they hold sufficient knowledge of the equipment. If training is undertaken in-house then it will be important to ensure that a suitable protocol is written and followed so that all employees receive the same level of training and so that the organisation can prove due diligence if there is an accident and the enforcing authority were to investigate the incident.

Employees who are required to operate the equipment should be given the manufacturers instructions, operating procedures, safe systems of work and any risk assessments that have been prepared so that they can read the information. Any training that is given to staff should be verified to ensure that the individuals have retained the appropriate levels of knowledge and are competent to use the apparatus, if necessary this should be in the form of a written test that is kept on file for future reference. If the individuals do not meet with the appropriate grade then the individual should be retrained or prevented from using the equipment.

All employees should be advised about all safety features associated with the machinery/ tools to guarantee that they are used correctly and safety mechanisms such as interlocks are not tampered with or defeated.

As with all training, it is important that you record what guidance has been given to individuals so that if necessary additional training can be provided as new hazards come to light. These records may also be required to be provided to the enforcing authority should an accident occur in order to prove that the training has been completed and that staff are competent to use the equipment. It will be important to remember that part time members of staff and temporary employees who are hired to cover for sickness and holiday periods are also suitably trained to operate equipment and undertake the tasks safely. This may not always seem commercially viable, as the temporary member of staff may only be with you for a short time, however the cost of an accident can often out way the costs spent training individuals.

Under no circumstances should you assume that staff can use work equipment especially if they have just joined the organisation, even if they have used similar equipment with previous employers. So if you feel that current employees have not undertaken the appropriate training, then now is the time to consider what retraining is required.