When working at heights in Victoria, it is crucial to do a risk assessment. This is examining carefully what could harm people in your workplace. A risk assessment enables you to gauge whether you have taken the necessary precautions or you should do more to prevent any harm. According to law, employers should assess the risks in their workplace to put in place a plan to control risks. It is vital for you to know how to do a risk assessment not only to comply with the legal requirements in your state but also to make sure people can work in a safe environment.

Creation of working at height risk assessment

There are a few steps involved in doing a risk assessment at your workplace and these include:

• Hazard identification

• Deciding who might be harmed and how they might be harmed

• Evaluation of the risks and coming up with precautions

• Finding-recording and implementation

• Review of your assessment and doing any necessary updating

Identifying hazards

It is crucial to start by identifying hazards in your workplace. You can do this through observations, getting feedback from employees, checking the instructions from manufacturers and datasheets for equipment and reviewing the past accident records in the workplace. This may involve looking out for things such as trip and slip hazards, cleaning chemicals, lone-working manual handling or fire risks.

Deciding who might be harmed

The second step for risk assessment for working at heights safety in Australia involves looking at every specific hazard and identifying the people who might get harmed. People at risk may include members of the public, customers, specific groups of employees and visitors. Some employees at your workplace may have particular requirements such as expectant mothers, young workers, and people with disabilities, sub-contractors and part-timers. You should try and consider every person in your work area where there is a risk of hazard.

Risk evaluation

After identifying risks, you need to evaluate it and decide whether you can eliminate the risk. If you cannot eliminate the risk, you should come up with ways to control the risk. Think about your existing control measures. Are they sufficient or do you need to improve on them or introduce new ones?

Record your findings

If your workplace has more than five employees, you are required by law to record their findings for risk assessment. However, you should do so even if your workplace has fewer employees. It is crucial to keep records. Use a fresh sheet for each risk assessment and for each area of your workplace. Make sure that each risk assessment is dated.

Review and update

Working at heights Victoria in Australia can be dangerous and you should check regularly such as every six months to see whether there have been any changes in your workplace that could affect your risk assessment. You need to be sure to update your assessment to ensure it is always up-to-date. For example, if there is an accident, you have a new staff member or you introduce new equipment.