The Future Of Scaffolding Safety? | Health and Safety
London-based company SafeTime have been
crowned the winners of the prestigious 2014 Beaumont Safety Trophy, awarded by the
Construction Health & Safety Group (CHSG).
The award was presented to SafeTime by
Bouygues UK, a prominent building and construction company, and
acknowledges the business’ dedication to reducing the risks
associated with working at height. The CHSG state that the Beaumont
Safety Trophy is designed to show appreciation for those who
actively strive to ‘improve occupational health and safety in the
construction industry’.
SafeTime were awarded the trophy for their
new CDC device, which beat new innovations from runners up
Brickworker Ltd, JSP Ltd, and Mace Ltd, who all received commended
awards. The compact device, which is used onsite, works in
conjunction with the SafeTime Android app for tablets and
smartphones, and works to improve safety for those working on or in
the vicinity of scaffolding, trade towers, or mobile scaffold
equipment. The advantages of the SafeTime device and app are
twofold – they reduce the workload of scaffolding inspectors and
minimise the risk of human error, and they also increase safety for
those working at height.
The HSE report that it is the legal
responsibility of trade scaffolding workers to ensure that their
access towers are inspected by a Construction Industry Scaffolders
Registration Scheme (CISRS) member when the trade scaffolding
towers are erected, and every 7 days following, until the scaffolding
is dismantled. Not only can filing reports be hugely time consuming
for inspectors, but there’s also a significant risk of human error
– a failure to complete a specific checkbox could mean the
difference between mobile towers complying with legal guidelines or
not. The SafeTime device, which processes inspection reports
electronically, improves the efficiency of inspections, and also
makes it easy to spot any errors.
For construction workers, the SafeTime device
and app can make working at height much safer. The device clearly
shows the number of days since the last inspection, and
automatically sends emails to relevant parties as and when an
inspection is due, so workers can be confident that they’re working
on secure towers rather than some dodgy DIY scaffolding. If a
defect is spotted on the tower, the device can be told to alert all
workers, via email and via the device itself, that the scaffolding
should not be used until a thorough inspection has taken place. In
a nutshell, what this device does is share safety information
instantly to reduce risk, and it’s expected to become the must-have
trade tool for 2015.
