Lone Working: Understanding the Risks

Depending on how your organisation operates, there may be members of staff who are considered a lone worker. Lone working, by its very nature can sometimes be a challenging prospect for staff as they can sometimes feel isolated and unsure of what to do in an emergency. There are additional risks associated with lone working, which need to be identified and addressed. As such, organisations need to ensure that they understand fully the risks associated with lone working and ensure that a Safe System of Work is introduced, to ensure that these risks are reduced to as low as is reasonably practicable.

What is a lone worker?

A lone worker is described as ‘someone who works by themselves without close or direct supervision’. As the definition is so wide-ranging, lone workers exist across all sectors.

Examples of lone working

Examples of lone working include:

• Those who work alone at a fixed base (i.e., those working in shops, and petrol stations.
• Those who conduct out of hours works (i.e., cleaners, security guards, maintenance engineers)
• Those who work from home
• Those who work away from a fixed base (i.e., care workers visiting people’s homes, mobile engineers, service workers (postal staff, taxi drivers, estate agents, those in sales) and delivery drivers).

This is not an exhaust list and will include numerous other roles where there is an element of them working by themselves without close or direct supervision.

Is it legal to work alone?

Yes, it is!

If your organisations offers services whereby staff need to work alone, this is entirely legal. However, organisations have a legal obligation to ensure the health, safety and welfare at work of all staff, including those who carry out lone working. Organisations therefore need to establish a health and safe working environment for lone workers, by ensuring that the risk associated with lone working are identified and controls implemented to reduce those risks, to as low as is reasonably practicable.

What are the risks with lone working?

Lone workers face the same hazards at work as all other members of staff, however, there is a greater risk of these hazards causing harm. The reason for this is because they may not have anyone to help or support them if things go wrong.

For example, a cleaner working during the day and at night face the same risks associated with their works, however, if they are an out-of-hours cleaner, should any of risks come to fruition, they may not be in a position to be able to call for assistance.

Aside from the standard operational risks associated with their activity, lone workers are also subject to additional risks, including:

• Personal safety
• Stress, Mental health and wellbeing
• Interaction with plant and equipment
• Driving for work

Lone working control measures?

Before looking into the specific risks associated with lone workers within your organisation, you need to consider the lone worker(s), the people they are likely to come into contact with and how this has a bearing on the risk. For example:

• Their experience: the more experienced the worker, the more they understand about their role, the risks associated with it and their experience with lone working.
• Their training: what training have they had? Those staff who have had lone working training, de-escalation techniques and first aid training will be more adept
• Any vulnerabilities: are there any reasons why they might be more vulnerable that others, examples include the young, inexperienced, disabled or pregnant.

Typical control measures which can be implemented include:

1. Supervision: this can be from simple periodic check-ins whilst carrying out their work, frequent 1-2-1’s to understand workloads and stress factors (and implement a programme of support) as well as both general and mental health support. The level of supervision will depend on the risks involved and the lone workers ability to identify and handle health and safety issues which may be presented to them during their work.
2. Training: providing training to staff on de-escalation and personal safety will provide staff with the tools to be able to operate safely alone
3. Emergency procedures: identifying how the organisation will deal with any likely emergencies which could occur when working alone, for example violence, breakdowns, road traffic accidents, first aid instances etc.

This is not an exhaustive set of controls and will depend on the nature of the activities and the member of staff. You should consult with lone workers when developing systems of work, to ensure that you give them a voice and understand the risks associated with their work to ensure that all risks have been covered.

What is a lone working risk assessment?

In line with health and safety legislation, organisations have a legal duty (and moral obligation) to assess the risks to the health and safety of its employees, as well as those who could be exposed by their operational undertakings.  For those organisations who employ 5 or more persons, any risk assessment must be formerly recorded.

However, there is no legal requirement to conduct a separate, specific lone worker risk assessment. In practice, you need to ensure that the risks associated with lone working are included with your standard operational risk assessment.

Should I have a lone working policy?

A lone worker policy can be a great addition to your overall health and safety management system, by clearly setting out how the organisation intends to control the risks associated with lone working, including the production of risk assessments, emergency plans, training and information, as well as detailed roles and responsibilities.

Summary

For those organisations which have staff who do work alone, you need to ensure that you introduce a safe system of work which provides staff with a degree of comfort that you have identified the risks associated with their role and lone working and have implemented control measures to reduce that risk. Additionally, you need to empower these members of staff, by providing them with the correct level of information, instruction training and supervision to allow them to complete their role in a manner which secures their health, safety and wellbeing.

How can USP help?

At USP, we have worked with a great number of client’s who have a lone working element to their operations and have successfully implemented a Safe System of Work to ensure the health, safety and wellbeing of its lone worker workforce.

If you would like to speak with one of our consultants, please emails us at info@universal-safety.co.uk or call us on 01903 942996.