As a business owner, you may realize that using the services of a walkway auditor could improve the safety of your employees and customers. Many mistakenly think that walkway auditors just provide a one-time flooring audit, create a report and then move on to the next job. However, walkway auditors can provide both an initial audit of your workspace, and continue with ongoing services designed to benefit you through the upcoming months and years.
Initial Audits
When the certified walkway auditor does the initial audit, it’s a comprehensive review of the business facility. This thorough assessment will cover the entire facility and the auditor will need access to identify all the hazardous areas. The auditor will take notes about the different levels of walkways and do tests as needed, such as to check each area’s level of friction. The walkway auditor will also talk with certain employees about flooring maintenance, cleaning and upkeep.
The walkway auditor will then prepare a report that ranks the walkways at the facility by risk factor and includes diagrams outlining the areas with the greatest risk for slip and fall hazards. Of course, the walkway auditor will have plenty of advice on what you need to do to minimize the risks in those hazardous zones.
Once the initial audit report is completed, you can use the information within it to make changes and corrections to your facility. This initial audit will act as a baseline to compare all future audits.
Follow Up Audits
After the initial audit and report, you have the opportunity to make the recommended changes as suggested by the walkway auditor. During this time, you can take action toward minimizing the slip and fall risks in some of the most hazardous areas. Actions might include replacing flooring, changing cleaning procedures, switching cleaning products, adding slip-resistant mats and so forth.
The walkway auditor can provide you with a follow up audit to officially confirm that the actions you have taken have indeed made a difference in the hazardous areas in the workplace. This follow up audit can prove that the recommended actions had the intended effect of reducing the potential for workplace slip and fall accidents.
Monitoring Audits
After the follow up audit, a walkway auditor’s service isn’t necessarily finished. Even after corrections, your workplace floors will still be exposed to ongoing traffic, contaminates and weather. It’s not uncommon for a previously audited and tested floor to creep back into the hazard zone. A monitoring audit will verify whether your company’s cleaning program is still effective, watch for wear and tear and so forth. Monitoring audits are also valuable as an ongoing written record of your efforts to keep the floors safe in your facility, in the event of a liability lawsuit resulting from a slip and fall accident where the plaintiff is trying to show negligence.
Remember that regular walkway audits can help you make sure your facility is as safe as it can be and minimize the risk of accidents to employees and customers. It’s important for your flooring to stand up to years of foot traffic and cleaning procedures, and a walkway auditor can help you out with that.
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