Inspecting public areas checklist

If parts of your premises are accessible to members of the public, then you’ll need to take special care to protect them. Our checklist will help you spot any problems.

Why you need this checklist

Members of the public are more vulnerable to injury on your site because they won’t be familiar with the risks, particularly the elderly, young children and the disabled. You may therefore need to implement additional precautions to protect them.

Our checklist includes all of the common hazards which you should consider, such as:

• moving vehicles
• tools and machinery
• the stability of display items
• hazardous substances
• hot surfaces, liquids and naked flames
• slips, trips and falls
• finger trapping points
• choking hazards; and
• deep water.

Use this checklist to carry out a quick audit of your arrangements, then keep a signed copy on file to demonstrate that you took your duty of care seriously. Make sure that you complete any improvements - note them in the “further action” section at the end of the document.