Everyone is back at work, students are back at school and lone workers are still asking ‘How can I stay safe while working alone?’ Fear not, we’ve got you covered.
Each year here at LONEALERT, we stop and think about how the law on lone working and the safety of lone workers is in such a grey area. With incidents occurring on a regular basis, surely it is enough for everyone to stop and realise the safety measures we need to take when lone working.
When I was younger, my Mom used to say to me ‘Alex, text me when you get there’ as I was leaving to go to a friend’s house, a simple text message to let a loved one know ‘I’m here and I’m safe’. Why does this stop? We seem to believe that as we get older, we don’t need to keep people updated on where we are and if we are ok. How wrong can we be?
There isn’t a single person on this planet that can guarantee their safety while working alone, everyone is always at a risk, no matter how small the risk is. The question I ask you today as an employer or employee is ‘Should you or your employee be attacked, pass out, trip over or anything to the extreme, would someone be able to get the emergency help the lone worker requires?
You may be thinking ‘but I don’t always work alone, 95% of my job is with me being around colleagues or members of the public’. However, that remaining 5% is still enough for an incident to happen. With simple, affordable and easy to use lone worker solutions, lone working needs to leave the ‘grey’ area and be put in the black and white.
We hear about Health and Safety in every induction pack when we start a new job, with employers telling us what rooms we can and can’t enter, how we should pick up heavy boxes and the steel toe cap boots to where when visiting the factory. It is very rare that you will be told about what to do when you are staying late at the office, alone, or when you are driving to go visit a client, alone. My message here isn’t to scare you, it’s to raise awareness on how we need to work together in keeping safe and secure throughout this year while lone working.
If you do have any questions on lone working and what you can do to protect yourself or your staff, please do call us on 0330 999 8484 or email [email protected] and we will be happy to help.
Have a great year!
