Continuing the conversation around working from home: the health & safety considerations

Did you see Kate Palmer on BBC Breakfast this morning talking about what rights employers and employees have when it comes to working from home? It was a great watch, with Kate demonstrating her and Peninsula's expertise on national TV.

And continuing the conversation about remote working, one thing many businesses are unaware of is that they have legal requirements when it comes to the health & safety of employees who work from home.

Duty of care

Under UK law, employers have a duty of care to ensure that all employees have a safe working environment, regardless of location. DSE Regulations and Workplace Regulations require employers to put measures in place to reduce risk to employees, which means a risk assessment must be completed prior to allowing any long-term home working.

This doesn’t necessarily mean employers have to visit employees’ homes in order to carry out risk assessments. In most cases providing guidance on how to set up their home office, self-assessment tools, and clear, continuous communication will suffice.

Ultimately, employers have the same duty of care toward home workers as they do towards office workers – they must ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, their health, safety, and welfare whilst at work.

Managing accidents

Another thing to consider is how to manage accidents that happen whilst an employee is working from home.

The phrase, ‘whilst at work’, is the key factor in deciding practical control measures here. Not everything a home worker does during the course of their day can be considered ‘work-related’. Determine the scope of their work from home, whether that’s attending meetings or simply carrying out work from a PC or laptop.

Anything non-work-related in their day, i.e., making a cup of tea, going up and down stairs, is not considered within the employers’ control. It is not ‘reasonably practicable’ for an employer to specify the height of an employee’s home stairs, or the flooring in their kitchen – as it does not relate to their work duties.?

Electrical equipment for home workers

Remember that electrical components in a home worker’s house are not subject to the same testing requirements as an office building. This can easily be dealt with during a home assessment by ensuring that plugs are correctly wired, that cables are covered and undamaged, and by providing circuit breakers for connecting work equipment to the domestic power supply.

Work equipment should be shut down and switched off at the end of the working day.

The home worker should be trained and instructed to carry out basic visual checks on their electrical equipment and to report faults for repair. From time to time, the equipment should be checked and tested by a competent person according to the company’s test and maintenance schedule.

Insurance

Lastly, employers should ensure that their compulsory Employers’ Liability Insurance policy is broad enough to cover employees working at home.?Employees should be advised to check that their own household insurance, will not be invalidated if they start working from home.