Lone worker policy

Due to the risks that can arise from staff working alone, it’s important that you have a lone worker policy in place to help you manage them.

Managing lone working

Lone working is another potential threat to staff safety. Therefore, it’s important for any business which allows staff to work alone to have a Lone Worker Policy in place. This will help you to both identify and manage the risks to those who don’t work in close proximity to others.

Getting a policy together

Putting an effective policy on lone working together requires a number of different elements. Apart from a general statement and a section that defines what lone working is, it briefly sets out the legislative requirements. Section four looks at risk assessment and the need to identify all job roles that involve lone working. Once this has been done, there are seven bullet points that highlight the factors to be considered in the risk assessment. These include the need to assess the risk of violence and the medical fitness of the individual. The fifth section moves on to consider various control measures that are appropriate for most lone working scenarios. These include the need to have regular communication in place, first aid provision and emergency procedures. Where appropriate, section six can be used to detail any activities where a risk assessment has shown lone working is inappropriate. The remaining sections look at training, line management responsibilities and lone worker duties.