There are all sorts of weird and wonderful ways we can end up injuring ourselves – but there are also a lot of ways we can end up injured in an accident that was completely foreseeable! Employers have an important duty of care to ensure that their employees are safe and free from any hazard whilst at work. This goes down to the premises being safe, to the machinery being safe, and personal protective equipment being provided.
Having safe equipment and being provided with the right personal protective equipment(PPE) are two of the most important regulations an employer must adhere to. After all, the requirement for equipment is normally in place to prevent an obvious and unavoidable hazard in the work place. You wear hard hats on a building site, masks when using a welder, gloves when handling hot or dangerous liquids / chemicals – the regulations and the legislation in place are clear.
Equipment – In General
Equipment should be regularly inspected and maintained to ensure it remains safe and does not pose a hazard to those using it. Machinery and plant equipment should have sufficient guards to prevent accidental access to dangerous parts, and should always have a plentiful amount of emergency stop buttons within easy reach of your working position.
Equipment should be provided to assist with tasks deemed dangerous for an employee; such as lifting equipment to manoeuvre heavy or awkward objects, or a mechanical saw for cutting a heavy piece of material – rather than a hand saw and risking a strain injury. All this equipment – in fact, any equipment in the workplace – must be regularly maintained and inspected to ensure it is continually safe to use.
Failing to adhere to safety guidelines and failing to regularly inspect and maintain equipment leaves your employers liable to compensation you if you have been injured!
Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
If your body is exposed to obvious risks in the workplace, your employers must provide you with PPE to ensure you come to no harm. Do you work with hot liquids? Your employers need to ensure you have protective gloves and / or overalls to prevent contact with a hot or dangerous substance harming your body. Work on a building site? You should be provided with a hard hat, good quality sturdy footwear, and probably gloves, to prevent the many hazards around a building site harming you in any way.
Failing to provide you with, not only the necessary personal protective equipment, but adequate equipment, or failing to regularly replace and renew / repair old personal protective equipment, leaves your employers liable to compensate you if you are injured!
Claiming for an Accident at Work
If you have been injured at work, and it wasn’t your fault, you can claim compensation from your employer’s liability insurance they have in place that covers all of their employees for accidents at work. If your employers are responsible for your injuries, you can claim from their insurance. All employers have a legal requirement have insurance in place for their employees to claim from for injuries at work. It’s there to be used – it exists to claim from – so it’s a completely normal and natural process to claim from your employers insurance.
Many people are worried about claiming from their employers. To be honest, there’s no need to be! Your employers cannot adversely affect your employment for claiming from their insurance. The insurance exists to claim from, and we find that most employers are quite happy for employees to claim from them – after all, you, as their employee, have been injured in the call of duty. It’s only fair you are compensated for your suffering and losses!
For specialist advice, don’t hesitate to get in touch for a free and friendly, no obligation chat about accident at work claims.
