Part 4 — Maintain a safe working environment

Keep entry and exit and movement safe

To keep the workplace safe from slips, trips and falls, you need a consistent system for regularly cleaning, tidying, and repairing floors and walkways. This means having a reliable plan to quickly address spills, clutter, and damage so that everyone can move around the workplace without tripping or falling.

You also need to plan for bad weather and take action when it happens. This means making sure walkways are safe for walking by dealing with any slippery conditions caused by rain or snow. If you can't fix the problem right away, you need to block off the area and give people a safe way to get around it. Make it easier to see by adding warning signs or better lighting.

To keep everyone safe when entering, exiting, and moving around the workplace, means regularly checking for issues, quickly reporting problems, making sure everyone is trained and properly supervised, working well with others involved, and making sure everyone has the right tools, time, and resources to do their job safely.

Maintenance

An effective maintenance plan keeps people safe from slipping, tripping, and falling by making sure floors are clean, dry, and clear of things in the way, and that the lights are bright and even so you can easily see where you're going and avoid hazards. This means regularly cleaning up spills right away, removing clutter, and using special mats that don't slip, while also making sure the lights are bright enough to see everything clearly without hurting your eyes.

A proactive maintenance plan together with a reliable reporting system, can help reduce the risks of slips, trips and falls.

Keep floor surfaces safe for access. This involves ongoing maintenance of floor surfaces, including stairs and ramps:

Maintenance includes:

• repairing or replacing the damaged floor surfaces. Examples include, repairing
  • torn carpet
  • curling mats
  • uneven or broken concrete
  • chipped or cracked tiles
• fixing any changes in floor heights
• maintaining the slip resistance of flooring with the correct cleaning methods
• improving slip resistance with surface treatments as needed
• removing any loose matting
• repairing leaky roofs.

Maintain equipment and lighting by:

• repairing or replacing parts to prevent leaks and spillage
• maintaining lighting by replacing bulbs, cleaning light fittings, adjusting for changes in daylight hours throughout the year.

Maintain outdoor walkways, including:

• maintaining level accessways. Examples include, evening out accessway if rutted, adding gravel if muddy, regularly grading unpaved surfaces, removing large rocks and ruts from walkways and working surfaces.
• regularly clearing or trimming vegetation over paths.

Highlight slip and trip hazards, such as:

• where the floor cannot be fixed or replaced immediately, alerting any changes in height or surface with hi-visibility anti-slip paint or reflective tape
• maintain line markings for walkways and storage areas.

Cleaning

An effective cleaning program is essential for the removal of contaminants on floor surface’s and can help maintain the grip of flooring. An effective cleaning program should prevent unsafe access to wet areas and provide a system that gives clear cleaning responsibilities.

Even if you clean your floors regularly, you should also do an intensive deep clean sometimes to get rid of dirt that builds up over time that regular cleaning can't reach, because this build-up can make your floors slippery.

An effective cleaning program involves:

• developing and co-ordinating a floor cleaning system, procedures and schedule for daily cleaning routine, periodic deep cleaning and managing spills.
• making cleaning supplies easily available to all staff
• using effective ways to keep pedestrians off floors that are still wet and unsafe, such as
  • using temporary safety barriers to keep pedestrians out of wet areas
  • providing an alternate safe route to the wet unsafe walkway
  • carrying out cleaning in an alternate manner to provide safe access, for example, cleaning a hallway in sections rather than all at the same time.
• planning for and managing the effects of weather on floor surfaces
• consulting and working together with employees and cleaning staff to ensure updates and changes in cleaning process or wet areas are communicated.

Housekeeping

Good housekeeping prevents workplace slips, trips, and falls by eliminating hazards through regular cleaning, organizing walkways, securing floor surfaces, managing spills promptly, ensuring adequate lighting, and training workers to maintain a tidy environment and report hazards.

This includes putting all items away according to a standard and schedule. It involves consulting and working with employees so that everyone understands what is expected from good housekeeping.

Good housekeeping requires:

• setting the expected housekeeping standard and schedule
• allocating responsibilities, roles, time, equipment and other required resources
• communicating the expected housekeeping standard and responsibilities
• providing alternate safe access if accessways are blocked
• encouraging immediate reporting of hazards, including contamination to ensure a quick response to control
• clearly marked, with hi-visibility paint or tape, accessways and walkways, delivery and storage areas, waste management areas and vehicle parking
• providing supervision and training to ensure expected standards are being met
• conducting regular inspections of the workplace to check that the housekeeping standard is met.

Keep accessways clear, which includes maintaining clear and even surfaces for walkways and ensuring equipment, fittings and material are not extending into walkways.

Put in place an efficient waste management system for each work area and the whole site. This includes:

• maintaining designated areas for waste materials or bins
• providing enough bins close to where waste is generated
• regularly collecting waste before waste overflows onto the ground or into the workspace or walkways.

Minimise trailing cable and hoses over accessways. For example:

• use cordless tools where possible
• position power sources closer to area of work
• re-route or suspend cables overhead
• use wall-mounted storage hooks, shelves or hose spools. Or, if unable to avoid, bundle cords, use retractable holders, recess cable and hosing into the floor or secure temporary cables to floor with bevelled protective covers or tape.

Manage storage of items by:

• providing adequate storage space
• co-ordinating scheduling and storage of deliveries. For example, co-ordinate deliveries to align with when a specific trade will start and with the location of the work area.
• tidying up, including returning items to correct storage areas and removing any items from walkways and stairs and ramps.

Weather planning

Weather can impact safe access and movement on floor surfaces outdoors as well as indoors.

Be ready for bad weather, like a predicted storm — check the forecast and get equipment ready beforehand. For example, put metal mats or wooden planks on muddy paths before a storm to keep them safe to walk on.

Good design and planning of the workplace and site can minimise impact. For example, an effective drainage system and a canopy over building entries can minimise the impact of heavy rain.

Consulting with employees is important early in the planning stage and for managing each weather event.

Manage safe outdoor accessways for weather events —you should:

• consider what can be expected with weather events. For example, overnight rain and high winds can result in branches being blown over, debris strewn around site or rain puddles forming
• plan what needs to be done when a weather event occurs, so you can ensure safe entry, exit and movement at the workplace. For example, after high winds and rain, do a full site inspection, remove debris and dewater main accessways, and check that the site is safe before allowing employees to return to work.
• ensure that people and equipment are available and that equipment is in good order for when it is needed
• prevent access if conditions are not safe and providing a safe alternate route
• consult with employees and HSRs to plan for and action what is required to manage the weather events
• plan for improvements to accessways to ensure they remain safe after a weather event. For example, the storm water drain that is too small to adequately cope with a standard rain event resulting in pooled water and mud in accessways, is replaced with a larger capacity drain.

Manage safe indoor access and movement following weather events by:

• designing to minimise rain entering the building, for example, by installing canopies over building entries
• containing rainwater and mud entering the building. For example, using entrance matting which has enough capacity and size to absorb rain before walking onto hard flooring, using scraper mats to catch mud and dirt before entering the building and by providing wet umbrella bags or microfibre dryers at entrances
• directing safe access such as during a heavy rain event, channelling pedestrian traffic from the front door, so people are required to walk on absorbent entry matting to minimise tracking rainwater through the building.

Visibility and detecting hazards

Good lighting and the ability to detect hazards are crucial to prevent slips, trips, and falls because they allow individuals to clearly see the path of travel and identify potential dangers like spills, obstructions, or uneven surfaces. Without adequate visibility, hazards are obscured, increasing the likelihood of missteps, stumbles, and loss of balance, which can lead to serious injuries.

Slips, trips and falls risks are greater when they:

• are unexpected. For example, hazards immediately around a corner or a one rise step such as an isolated single step.
• cannot be easily seen, for example due to poor lighting, shadows or poor visual contrast of hazards
• are blended into surroundings. For example, holes that are concealed by grass or nearby walking surfaces that look continuous and level but are different to walk on, like a gutter next to a similar looking walking path with a different height, grip or slope.

Lighting, glare and reflections

If it's hard to see where people are walking or if there are hidden tripping hazards on the ground, it makes it much harder to spot and avoid dangerous situations that could cause a slip, trip, or fall.

When a bright light shines directly into your eyes, like from an uncovered window, it can make it hard to see things clearly because of the glare. This is like when sunlight bounces off a shiny surface, like a car or a mirror, and also blinds you a bit. Too much bright light coming at you from different angles can make it difficult to spot dangers around you.

Visibility hazards include:

• low light levels
• dark shadows
• changes in lighting (for example moving from brightness to darkness)
• substantial amount of dust or particles in the air
• glare or reflections.

Make sure there is enough even lighting at the workplace, so employees can see clearly without any blinding glare or dark spots, so they can move around safely and do their work properly. Check the lights regularly to make sure they're working right and clean them often to keep them shining at the intended brightness.

For more information on recommended illumination levels for different areas and activities view designing a healthy and safe working environment.

Provide and maintain suitable light levels. This includes:

• providing even lighting levels that are necessary for employees to their work safely
• providing necessary outdoor lighting to allow employees to move safely on outdoor paths, around outdoor work areas, and car parks when light levels are low
• adjusting hours of operation of outdoor lighting for seasonal changes and daylight saving
• ensuring emergency lighting is available for the safe evacuation of people in the event of an emergency
• providing extra lighting at locations of increased risk such as crossing points on traffic routes
• adjusting lighting in transition areas. For example, walking from a bright outside area to an enclosed and darker stairwell. Provide higher lighting levels in the stairwell to minimise the difference in light levels between the 2 areas, allowing peoples’ eyes to accommodate to this change
• replacing light bulbs as soon as they start to dim or flicker or introduce a program that replaces bulbs before they are expected to stop working
• maintaining light levels by regularly cleaning light fixtures to minimise dust and dirt.

Provide extra lighting, when needed. This may include:

• adding or repositioning light fixtures
• painting walls and ceilings white or a light colour that reflects light
• considering skylights or windows that bring in natural light
• using sensor lighting for areas where there is intermittent movement or for periods of low light level
• considering wireless, solar or battery lighting options for areas where it is difficult to install electrical lighting.

Correct glare and reflection by, for example:

• using window coverings to control incoming light and minimise glare from outside
• replacing large high-intensity light fixtures with several smaller low-intensity fixtures
• installing diffuse light fixtures that spread light over a wider area
• using suitable cover over bare bulbs to control light
• minimising reflective surfaces with matte paint or floor mats.

Visual contrast

Sufficient visual contrast helps people to identify where to step safely and any changes along the floor surface. Visual contrast can assist people to respond appropriately, and in enough time, to hazards that may cause a slip, trip or fall.

Visual contrast is the difference in the lightness and darkness that makes objects distinguishable from their backgrounds.

Good visual contrast is important to assist pedestrians, including those who are visually impaired, to safely walk around. Visual contrast is about lightness or darkness, rather than the colour, as colours that look different may have little visual contrast.

Examples of where visual contrast is necessary include:

• nosing or front edge of steps
• start and end of ramps
• handrails so that people quickly identify them when needed
• edges of loading docks, dock plate and platforms
• transition areas between different walking surfaces, for example, connecting floor surfaces
• trip hazards such as raised door frames, covers on electrical cords, protruding objects on floor or cracks in walkways.

Improve visual contrast to help employees navigate their surroundings. This can be done in a number of ways, for example by:

• using markings that have strong visual contrast to highlight changes in the walking surface such as nosing of steps and possible trip hazards.
• increasing ambient lighting, especially around entrances
• increasing the visibility of a fluid spill on a floor by cordoning off or using markers at edges of wet areas
• installing floors with high luminance contrast against foreseeable spills or fluids, for example, porous flooring which darkens when wet or improves visual contrast between flooring and likely fluid contaminants, such as cleaning products.

Noise and other distractions

The employer must monitor conditions at work, which includes noise, and eliminate or minimise levels above the exposure standard.

Being able to hear well is very important because it allows you to pick up on important sounds that could warn you of danger. For example:

• someone or something coming up on you unexpectedly
• things falling on the floor
• someone giving you instructions.

If you use headphones or ear buds, you might not be able to hear these potential dangers. Loud noises at work can also be distracting and make it hard to hear safety announcements and be aware of what's around you while walking.

If someone can't hear well, try to get their attention using things they can see, like hand signals or flashing a light.

Wear hearing protection as needed and avoid using headphones and ear buds to listen to music in areas where full attention is needed for safe walking and communication.

Minimise other activities that take attention away from walking safely.

When employees can't see well because of dim lighting, smoke, or wearing protective gear like goggles, it's harder for them to spot dangers around them, which can make them more likely to have accidents. This is especially important in places where they can't easily see where they're going or what's ahead of them.

Provide safe entry, exit and movement for employees and others at the workplace. Ensure accessways are even, with minimal changes in level and are kept clean and clear. Ensure regular maintenance, cleaning and housekeeping.

Reporting

If you see a potential safety issue at work, it's important to report it right away. This helps to stop bigger problems from happening. Everyone needs to know how to report a hazard or a near miss so they can keep the workplace safe.

Inform employees of the importance of early reporting of hazards that can cause slips, trips and falls.

Report all hazards, including:

• maintenance issues, for example damaged or hazardous walkways, equipment defects, poor lighting
• spills or unusual contamination like overflow or pooling of water
• slippery areas
• trip hazards
• damaged or worn footwear, that is provided as personal protective equipment (PPE).