1. Introduction
A significant number of people are required to, or wish to, work outside standard University hours, when levels of emergency assistance from staff e.g. specially trained first aiders may be reduced. Additional precautions must therefore be taken when working out of hours, especially where there is a foreseeable possibility of risk to the person concerned. Many people on and off campus work alone, both within and out of standard hours. Lone workers must not be at any greater risk than if they were not working alone. Home workers usually work alone and may work unusual hours. There are few prohibitions regarding working alone. The following items of legislation, which are relevant to university operations, require more than one worker to be involved in a specific activity:
Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002: Certain fumigation work and other specified work with substances hazardous to health;
Electricity at Work Regulations 1989: Work at, or near, a live electrical conductor;
Confined Spaces Regulations 1997: Entry into a confined space, for example, sewers or tanks.
2. Definitions
Lone workers are people who 'work by themselves without close or direct supervision.' (The Health and Safety Executive).
Lone Working covers work tasks where individuals are knowingly and foreseeably placed in circumstances in which they undertake work activities without direct or close supervision or support. In practical terms, persons are working alone if they have neither immediate visual nor direct audible communication with someone who can provide direct assistance in the event of an accident or illness.
Normal working hours are defined as normally being between 08:00 and 19:00 hours, Monday to Friday. This definition does not preclude individual departments setting different working hours where operational needs dictate. For example, Campus Services outlets and the Sports Training Village routinely have staff and facilities working outside the University’s normal working hours and will set their normal working hours accordingly. At certain periods throughout the year, such as University closure days or at weekends, workers may be on site carrying out lone working tasks that would otherwise be acceptable during normal campus opening, but which are not appropriate at other times. Any tasks carried out during these periods should be risk assessed to ensure that any lone working implications are properly identified and controlled.
Home Working - habitually carrying out work for the University in a worker’s own home or other premises of the workers choice, but not on university premises. Employees do not become home-workers by occasionally choosing to work from home rather than at their usual place of work.
3. Risk assessment and authorisation to work
Out of hours and lone working must be authorised before it is allowed to take place. The level of authorisation required will depend on the activity being carried out and the level of risk identified. For low-risk out of hours activities, such as routine office working, authorisation may be covered by generic risk assessments. Lone working / working out of hours in Laboratories or workshops, or carrying out research or similar activities off site, will require written agreement from the Head of Department. Authorisation can either be as an open-ended authorisation for a named person or a specific one-off authorisation. It may be necessary to restrict the types of work that are permitted to be done, and this should be specified on the authorisation.
Before authorising lone working / out of hours working, the authoriser must ensure that the work has been risk assessed, and that assessments take account of the specific hazards associated with out of hours or lone working. Conducting and recording risk assessments for 'out of hours' work or lone working is particularly important because of the potential for difficulties in summoning help, including reduced access to first aiders, and there may be little or no supervision whilst work is carried out.
4. Out of Hours / lone working risk assessment
Risk assessing out of hours or lone work should be relatively simple to complete. The hazards involved in a work activity will largely remain the same as for normal hours or non-lone working; however, extra control measures may be needed to take account of there being fewer or no people nearby in the event if an accident or emergency.
Measures should be implemented to ensure that these workers are no more at risk than other workers carrying out similar tasks. Precautions should take account of the hazards and risks associated with the work itself and of foreseeable emergencies, e.g. fire, equipment failure, illness, and accidents. Lone workers, especially those who work at remote locations or outlying parts of the University estate (including campus grounds), should be able to quickly summon assistance in an emergency. Alternatively, they may require training in self-administering first aid.
It is recommended that the worker and their line manager work together to risk assess the activity. The agreed safe working procedures must be recorded and communicated to everyone who may be required to work alone, and to any colleagues who have a role to play in ensuring their safety. This could include advising Security or other departments.
One possible conclusion from the risk assessment may be that the risks cannot be reduced to acceptable levels. Lone or out of hours working should not be authorised for those tasks.
Further guidance on risk assessment and policy and guidance for general work activities is available on the SHEW Webpages.
5. Vulnerable employees
Lone and out of hours working risk assessments also need to take account of the people who will be doing the work and whether the worker might be at additional risk when lone working / working out of hours because of a characteristic or trait that is specific to them. The following are examples of issues to consider:
Expectant and nursing mothers
The University’s duty of care extends to the unborn child as well as risks to the mother herself. Therefore assessments must include the risk to any unborn child or any child who is still breast-feeding. Consideration must also be given to:
- reduced mobility may make the mother more prone to slips, trips and falls (especially in the later stages of pregnancy)
- reduced ability to carry out physically strenuous work
- increased likelihood of back injuries
- entitlement to more rest breaks
- risk of early labour or miscarriage
Read our guidance on managing work-related risks to new and expectant mothers.
Young people aged under 18 years
Young people need additional consideration because of their potential lack of knowledge, experience, and maturity in terms of recognising and understanding risks associated with their work. They may also feel less able to raise any concerns they might have about the work to be done.
Young people are entitled to more frequent rest breaks than older workers and this should be factored into their working time. Guidance on Young people in the workplace can be found here.
Disabled people
Medical fitness should not be a significant factor when considering typical office activities conducted outside normal hours. However, in other situations it may be necessary to check with the person that they do not have any medical conditions that could place them at increased risk when working alone. Both routine work and foreseeable emergencies may impose additional physical and mental burdens on an individual.
If a worker has mobility problems or a visual or hearing impairment, this may make unassisted evacuation difficult as they may have difficulty in raising the alarm when assistance is required, or they may need additional support to evacuate a building if the fire alarm sounds. These factors should be identified and addressed in the person’s Personal Emergency Evacuation Plan.
Where necessary, Occupational Health support should be accessed to advise on how employees with underlying health conditions or disabilities can be supported.
Contractors
Contractors must be given the same level of consideration as University employees when carrying out a risk assessment. Contractors are at additional risk because they may be unfamiliar with aspects of the University, including:
- layout and environment
- emergency procedures
- adjacent activities and hazards
6 Emergency Arrangements
Risk Assessments must identify the means for summoning help and for being contactable. Laboratory, workshop, and other activities where the risk is greater than that in general office duties, must only be carried out with others present or at least within earshot. This is primarily so that assistance will be readily available in the event of an accident. Campus infrastructure and services' workers e.g. grounds workers, plumbers, etc. often work alone, and risk assessments for such activities must consider lone working risks into consideration. The risk of injury in remote locations must be carefully assessed, and appropriate measures put in place to minimise this risk, including the means of obtaining timely and appropriate assistance in case of emergency.
If an internal telephone is not readily available to the lone worker, some other form of communication should be used. The University has a free app, called Safe Zone, that can be used to monitor lone working and to summon emergency assistance if needed.
If Safe Zone cannot be used, then other systems may be used. This could include providing two-way radios, telephone checking systems requiring users to report at agreed intervals to Security, or asking Security to regularly patrol the area where work is being undertaken.
7 Arrangements for working in campus buildings outside “Normal Working Hours”
It is recommended that the following procedure be operated as standard for working out of standard working hours in academic departments:
- A logging in/out book should be kept at, or near, the point of entry to the working area.
It should be mandatory for any person working out of agreed normal hours to sign in and out every time they enter or leave the workplace.
If a person is already in the building at the end of the working day, they must sign in the book by 19:00hrs. This will enable Security and the fire service to ensure that everyone is accounted for in the event of a fire or other incident requiring evacuation.
The Head of Department should ensure that the book is available, and occasional checks for compliance with this procedure should be made, for example during safety inspections.
To ensure that someone does not inadvertently become a lone worker, the second last worker to sign out of the book (even if leaving for a short period), should inform the remaining person that they have become a lone worker. The use of this system should be recorded on the risk assessment.
8 Home working
Home working is frequently carried out alone and only low-risk activities are undertaken. Line managers are responsible for ensuring that there are adequate arrangements in place to safeguard the health and safety of home workers. The University’s Hybrid Worker Safety Guidance provides details on the range of issues to be considered and how these may be managed.
9 Lone working – fieldwork / Work away from campus
Fieldwork may take various forms which, if to be undertaken alone, must be carefully assessed for the additional risks that may occur. In particular:
measures for obtaining assistance in an emergency must be put in place
there must be a system for verifying the whereabouts and safety of a lone fieldworker, including a reporting-in system.
All fieldwork /work away from campus must be signed off by the relevant director / head of department. Where travel is to a destination where the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office has issued an advisory notice must be signed off by the Overseas Travel Group in accordance with University’s Working Away from University Premises Policy.
For guidance on other aspects of working off-campus or in the field, see the Fieldwork and Overseas Travel safety resources.
References
Copies of these references are available from Safety, Health and Employee Wellbeing:
Homeworking - Guidance for Employers and Employees on Health and Safety. INDG226 HSE.
Work with display screen equipment. Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992 as amended by the Health and Safety (Miscellaneous Amendments) Regulations 2002. Guidance on regulations: L26 (Second edition) Health & Safety Executive.