Accidents at Work - Part One

Every year thousands of people are injured at their place of work through no fault of their own. If you are injured in this way there is a good chance you are entitled to make a claim for compensation to cover loss of earnings, medical expenses and personal loss. Many things can cause an accident at work and in a series of posts we will look at some of them.

Unguarded or Defective Equipment

This is one of the big causes of injury in the workplace. It is your employers responsibility to properly maintain any equipment you may be using during the course of your duties but many often neglect this responsibility. Imagine you are working in a factory and tasked with using a circular saw, if the proper guards are not in place you could easily slip and cause yourself some serious damage. Your employer may say that you are responsible for not being attentive enough but if the proper safety precautions and equipment are not available you cannot be held responsible.


Inadequate or Poor Training and/or Supervision
Another common cause of injury is a lack of proper training for a particular job or lack of supervision when undertaking this job. Many employers think that it is okay just to tell you what to do and let you get on with it but this is not the case. They have a responsibility to properly and thoroughly train you for any task you may be expected to carry out, and once you have received this training they must provide supervision for the task for as long as both you and they feel is necessary. You should always try to call your employer out on this issue to avoid having an accident at work in the first place, if you don’t feel like they are providing enough training or supervision tell them.