It’s not easy being a business owner. There are a million things to care for and it’s not good enough to make a mistake now and then! This couldn’t be truer than with your electrical safety; there are compliance laws to keep for a reason. Hundreds die each year from electrical injury, making safety the responsibility first of the manager and then their staff.
What’s more, it doesn’t have to be difficult. There are many safety considerations that can be lumped together, making the management of your compliance requirements easy through services liked fixed wire testing from the team at questelectrical.co.uk.
Safe at all times.
That’s the requirement. Although you aren’t specifically needed to have electrical testing carried out, it’s worth doing so. It’s important to keep in mind how electricity works. It will always try to find the quickest and easiest path for it to earth to, making any faults and shoddy equipment in your electrical setup a potential pathway that can be easily missed. It isn’t always an instant danger, but if multiple faults are allowed to develop near to each other, you’ve got problems.
Let’s consider a ring-main as an example. You’ve got problems with it, namely that it has no actual continuity or connection to the earth. Instant issue; if you plug in an appliance to it, every single part of it that is metal could be effectively live and running electricity. Danger.
The 1989 safety act.
An important year for getting people to stop zapping themselves. The Electricity at Work Regulations act began working in earnest in this year, requiring all electrical tools and equipment to be safe to use. It also required that tools hired out must be safe, too.
Safety starts early.
It isn’t glamorous, it isn’t flashy, but it works. Electrical testing is invaluable in developing a culture of safety into your company – and for saving it money. Particularly true of late, property and business owners are now encouraged to arrange a testing schedule that’s consistent and thorough enough to avoid issues.
While you have some flexibility to how you arrange your schedule, it’s still the case that you need to have one in place that can reliably test all your equipment and hardware within one “cycle”. If you need to move around your testing visits to minimise disruption to work, you can do so within reason. That’s a helpful side point to avoid a higher effective cost of managing this element of your safety and compliance.
How often you’ll need to have your testing done will vary depending on the type of property and equipment used. Electrical installations are tested ten years for domestic sites, five for commercial and three years minimum for industrial areas. Generally speaking, the most at-risk items include workshop gear and general site equipment. This is partly due to the simple fact they get used more often, making the development of faults more likely.
Save money.
Lastly, a great electrical testing regimen will save a property owner money.
How? Simple! When testing your site, the certified engineers you hire to do your testing will also be able to help recommend areas in which your electricals could be improved. This could mean better energy efficiency, which can be a drastic expense for any manufacturing establishment or commercial property.
And with that, you’ll both manage your compliance and safety requirements while likely saving money in the long-run. A better way to view the management of your safety and a silver lining that will help boost your bottom line. Great stuff.
