Day: 26 August 2020

Jim Roberts of Beaverswood considers how to mitigate risk as COVID-19 changes the face of industrial health and safety.

 We are living through unprecedented times as the virus crisis reshapes so much of the UK’s economic landscape. Soaring online sales at the expense of high street trading is placing exceptional pressures on global supply chains and associated warehouses and logistics centres, which have had to gear up rapidly to meet increased demand and maximise productivity.

Online sales in 2020 are expected to grow 19% year-on-year, up from pre-pandemic estimates of 11%, rising from a total of £66bn in 2019 to almost £80bn this year*. Some forecasters suggest UK e-commerce will grow in value by as much as £5.3bn in 2020. Supermarket supply chains are also seeing surges in demand, placing additional pressure on their distribution and supply chain links.

UK manufacturers have also undergone something of a step-change because of COVID-19; refocusing their efforts and strategies on developing more home-grown production capacity, to ensure that there will be adequate supplies of healthcare products to meet future demand in the face of a second wave of infections.

As businesses realign their activities to meet the impact on infrastructures, resources and installations, the impact on workplace health and safety cannot be overstated: Employers must consider the paramount importance of keeping people and their workplace both safe and healthy while maximising productivity.

Warehouses, distribution sites and transport hubs can be hazardous places to work but the extra volume of activity and traffic currently being experienced simply adds to the dangers; increasing further the risk of accidents, collisions between forklift trucks and other vehicles, and damage to people and property. The extra capacity and productivity, including more people and vehicles in work environment, has forced many facilities to re-consider their safety systems, including traffic flow management and pedestrian segmentation.

Protection and responsibilities

Indeed, the sheer volume of people carrying out their responsibilities under one roof, to shift and store goods and load and unload vehicles, places paramount emphasis on safety at all times if incidents and accidents are to be avoided. Under UK law, employers must observe a duty of care to their workforce: they must identify the health and safety risks each person faces at work. This usually comes into force when a person or group of people do something that might reasonably harm somebody, which includes the possibility of physical injury.

In the context of work, duty of care is legally binding on an employer. Put simply, owners and operators must abide by what the law refers to as a standard of reasonable care – and this applies to any work-related matter that could injure someone in the workplace environment. These can range from slips and trips, through vehicles operating in and around the warehouse, to collisions and impacts with racking, corner sections and walkways.

That’s why it’s important to carry out site-specific risk assessments. And if an employer neglects their duty of care and a problem arises, an affected employee may be able to proceed with a claim of negligence with all the associated ramifications of financial penalties, legal costs and reputational damage.

Adopting a holistic approach to mitigating risk has to be seen as good practice and a sensible first step. And this includes combining practical safety standards with safe behaviour as a part of an efficient workplace operation. The key part of managing risk is the assessment – the effective process of evaluating threats to workers’ health and safety from workplace hazards in order to determine the measures required to eliminate or reduce the level of incidents/accidents.

So bearing this in mind, taking a pragmatic approach with the installation of Visusafe safety barriers can pay dividends. They help to maintain awareness while offering a reassuring presence in an area where it is more than likely a moving vehicle will be present, encouraging people in the warehouse to habitually check their surroundings. This will ensure that they will not step out into the path of any forklifts or loading vehicles – handy assets to have in place when it comes to ensuring workers remain alert and aware of their surroundings.

Safety barriers and protectors can also help to reduce the severity of damage, and cost, to both infrastructure and vehicles in the event of a collision. It only takes a moment’s carelessness for an accident to occur, with all the associated ramifications. In the unfortunate event of a collision, a safety barrier can dramatically lower the risk of physical injury and expensive damage during the current heightened operations.

A warehouse barrier system should be designed to standout, easily seen by the eye, particularly in environments where light levels may be low or inconsistent. Racking corners, vulnerable entrances and exit points should also be considered for protection by bollards and posts as part of an effective impact protection safety strategy.

Another area where workers can be at particular risk is during shift changes. People rushing to get home at the end of the working day, not looking where they are going or accidently knocking colleagues into rails or pylons in their haste to exit the premises, can all lead to injury to limbs and should be considered as part of any risk audit.

Good practice

Good practice around managing the health and safety issues to do with shift-work should see employers carry out a suitable assessment of the risks associated with shift work, as part of any organisation’s health and safety management system. You should record and review the risk assessment periodically and whenever changes to shift-working arrangements are considered or made.

A risk assessment requires an employer to consider factors at work and those who might be harmed by them. To do this, it is important to gather and evaluate information about current shift-work arrangements in an organisation before using the assessment to decide what is required to minimise risks.

Workers in warehouses can be struck by pedestrian operated pallet trucks, racks, or trolleys, so designated routes should be kept away from other workers where possible and indicated by designated barriers and railings that are clearly marked and visible. A risk assessment should have been carried out to consider what other work area specific hazards might be present.

Vehicle movement in and around warehouses requires careful auditing and constant management to prevent accidents. This requires workplace traffic routes that allow pedestrians and vehicles to circulate safely. Where vehicles and pedestrians use the same traffic route, there should be adequate separation between them and, if possible, complete separation of vehicles and pedestrians.

The racking in aisles must be organised and protected to allow for safe access to goods and movement of FLTs. The aisles should be sufficiently wide, with adequate clearance room overhead. Pedestrians and vehicles must be able to circulate in a safe manner. The areas in which FLTs operate should, if possible, should be clearly separated andmarked from the areas where pedestrians are likely to be.

As well as a responsibility for their workforce, employers have a responsibility towards visitors, contractors and members of the general public. Everyone needs to be shielded as far as practically possible from accident and injury while onsite, inside and outside of buildings.

There is always room for improvement when it comes to safeguarding people and property, so the importance of good health and safety practice and equipment cannot be overstated in the current climate. Once more, if your facility has increased its productivity, resource and capacity, then your safety measures may no longer be enough. An effective safety audit coupled with investment in robust and appropriate safety measures will go a long way to mitigating risk now and in the future.  In short, it’s good business.

Beaverswood manufactures innovative products that improve the efficiency, safety and sustainability of the physical workplace. Its range includes labelling and signage, waste segregation and 5S visual communication solutions, as well as health and safety products. Product is supported with specialist expertise, marketing and promotional materials and an aftersales service.

Piraeus Port Authority (PPA) S.A., member of COSCO SHIPPING Group, has decided to invest into end-to-end digitization and optimization. The company has awarded a project to Aachen-based optimization specialist INFORM to improve the efficiency and transparency of vehicle handling at the port’s car terminal.

In order to continue its growth of recent years and to further expand its strategic position, PPA is implementing an intelligent IT system from INFORM Vehicle Logistics that is designed to enable end-to-end transparency of all processes in the supply chain. Customers, suppliers, 3PL and customs authorities will be able to track via a web portal where and when a car has been delivered. In addition, the algorithms of this system are capable of optimizing the operational processes in the compounds through real-time decisions and advanced planning. Consequently, this system gives PPA the advantage of improving its offered services and the flexibility of planning new business processes.

The system will allow PPA to more effectively use available resources and to continuously improve their processes. In addition, it will allow PPA to increase their capacity to operate their car terminal. Covering over 145,000 square meters, the PPA’s car terminal provides a capacity of over 600,000 movements per year. Located close to the centre of Athens, the Port of Piraeus occupies a geostrategic position for the eastern Mediterranean region. It is also considered an important transit hub for trade between Europe and Asia.

“Digital decision making for us means both making automated optimized decisions as well as helping our customers’ management to make operational and tactical decisions more easily by providing reliable real-time data,” says Hartmut Haubrich, Director Vehicle Logistics Systems at INFORM. “In the case of PPA, for example, we will automatically generate workorders and optimize the workorders in real-time to ensure that operations are smooth and target dates are met efficiently. In this way, we will increase the service capacity of the terminal, but also the availability and intelligent allocation of storage spaces.”

The UK’s Office of National Statistics (ONS) figures show that in April this year, 30% of retail sales in the UK were conducted online. This figure compares with just 18% in the same month last year and 21% at the Black Friday/Christmas peak in 2019. By the end of April online sales across Europe, within the home and leisure sector, in which Dachser DIY-Logistics covers, were at a level more than double than experienced at the start of last year.

The COVID-19 pandemic and enforced lockdown has changed consumer buying behaviour dramatically and has accelerated the trend of growth in online shopping and the e-commerce economy. In fashion, home and leisure, sport and hobbies, the effect of online sales growth will become permanent once virus restrictions are lifted.

A recent global study by management consultants Accenture of previously infrequent e-commerce consumers found that their DIY tools and materials’ purchases jumped from 6% up to 14% during the crisis and are predicted to stabilise at a 16% level post-crisis. To whatever degree online becomes the chosen sales channel for Europe’s DIY product consumers in the future, it is clear retailers that have not positioned themselves for an e-commerce future will face particularly severe challenges.

Dachser in the UK and across Europe has a DIY-Logistics service to help this particular sector overcome these challenges, providing individually tailored logistics services for customers in the garden and DIY sector. Established twenty-two years ago, Dachser DIY-Logistics currently has an annual shipment volume of 7.5 million. These figures indicate the significance of this sector-specific logistics solution. The service came under the control of Jens Wollmann earlier this year. He emphasises, “The demands placed on the DIY suppliers and retailers by consumers are changing dynamically, now more than ever.

Those DIY suppliers and retailers that are embracing e-commerce sales are having to apply an omnichannel approach to inventory and order processing. This means using more efficient sourcing, warehouse management, transport and delivery tools, tracking both orders, stock and selecting the best distribution options for each shipment. Furthermore, speed and reliability become even more critical in their supply chain solutions.

Suppliers also experience other challenges brought about by the characteristics of an online market place. This can include irregular demand spikes, requiring sudden changes in supply capacity. These unpredictable order sizes can make managing the distribution difficult, for instance, direct delivery, holding inventory in intermediary hubs, last-mile delivery, proof of receipt and handling product returns.

As a consequence, Dachser is focusing on a range of tailored eLogistics services to adapt to the continuing digitalisation of its customers’ order processes and supply chains.”

This provides access to all relevant data concerning customer shipments, and this system has a direct connection with Dachser’s transport and warehouse management systems. eLogistics provides quick and easy information about all processes along the supply chain. There are numerous functions available for handling, control and transparency. Crucially in circumstances where online sales demands are immediate and fluctuating, there is the ability to track in-depth process sequences both in transit and in the warehouse when necessary.

Maximum transparency of the product supply chain, with whatever variations in routing, volumes, delivery criteria and unexpected disruptions that may occur, is vital in a DIY supplier’s competitive advantage within the future of the online sales.