Safe & Efficient
September 5th 2004

Many incidents of back injury and other mishaps result from badly organised premises and badly stored materials. The Workplace (Health and Safety and Welfare Regulations) 1992 lays down a number of key requirements for employers to follow to avoid such injuries

The most relevant rules linked to materials handling and distribution include: Maintaining the workplace in a clean and orderly fashion; Ensuring that floors and traffic routes are kept in a reasonable condition; Ensuring that suitable and effective measures are taken to prevent falls or injuries from falling objects; Ensure that there is organisation of traffic routes so that pedestrians and vehicles can circulate safely

The regulations stipulate that organisations must have precautions where people or materials might fall from open edges. These may be fencing or guardrails, or ensuring there is space for movement and access to machinery, for example. Employers are also urged to consider floor loadings and providing ample space for storing tools and materials

Lee Fox, project manager for materials handling at Kardex Systems, comments: "As well as reducing the number of days employees have to take off as the result of injuries, maintaining an organised and hazard free environment can help improve productivity levels and motivation." These general rules are a good starting point for managing a materials handling department in an orderly and safe manner, but what specific advice can organisations consider to ensure employee satisfaction and motivation, and at the same time meet health and safety guidelines? Manual Handling Health and safety regulations do not set limits on the weights employees can lift, but they do suggest general parameters for manual handling. For example, detailed assessment of risk must be undertaken if weights lifted to shoulder height exceed 20kg or to elbow height exceed 25kg. The rules also require that, wherever possible, manual handling is avoided and the need to bend, twist, stretch or stoop is kept to the minimum

In the UK, the Health and Safety Executive recommends that manual handling should be avoided completely if a safer way is practical. It argues that organisations should design jobs to fit work to the person rather than fit the person to the work. The benefits of this will take into account human capabilities and limitations, and improve efficiency as well as safety. For this reason Lee Fox advises the use of computerised automated storage systems to minimise overt manual handling: "In the logistics environment for example, speed of delivery highly important. Managers need to ensure that their workforce deliver materials on Just-In-Time basis. If there is lots of manual handling involved in this process, employees can be moving quickly and without thought to how they lift or move things, and this result in back and repetitive strain injuries

"Managers might consider automated storage systems, that enable materials be delivered to the employee at waist height, thereby cutting out the bending lifting associated with manual handling

a result the manager will also have a motivated workforce because the materials are available at the touch of a button with minimum effort." If manual handling is unavoidable are a number of tips that managers can implement and pass on to their employees to help avoid injury: Make the loads smaller/lighter or easier to grasp; Change the system of work to reduce the effort required; Improve the layout of the workplace to make the work more efficient; If lifting is required, advise the employee stop and think before they attempt the Do they need help? Is the area free of obstruction? Recommend a firm grip the feet apart, leading leg forward, don't jerk and move the feet - don't twist the body and keep close to the load; If they are struggling with the load, advise that they should put it down and then adjust the lifting technique. Safe Stacking In a storage environment the HSE recommend materials should be stacked and stored so they will not fall and cause injury. If manual stacking is unavoidable, materials should be stacked on a firm, level base. When needed, a properly constructed rack should be used, secured to the floor or wall if possible

Within the racks, shelves or on floors, materials should not exceed the safe load, and items should not be allowed to stick out from stacks or bins into gangways

Employees are advised not to climb racks to reach upper shelves and not lean heavy stacks against walls. Kardex implemented its shuttle system at a Swindon-based company to solve this sort of problem

It's made our work much more efficient," says storeman, Paul Johnsey. "Previously would have had to climb the stepladder six even 10 times for each pull, often with boxes in our hands. Now we can stand in front the Shuttle, punch in our requests and wait few seconds for them to be delivered to us

It is important that the correct container, pallet or rack for the job is also used

These should be regularly maintained and inspected so pallets and containers damaged beyond repair can be safely disposed of. Organisations should ensure stacks are stable, and they should consider marking a 'key' on stacked packages of uniform size so employees can see at a glance the size of the materials available

Lee Fox continues: "Automated storage systems can assist organisations to meet safety guidelines for stacking. Our Industriever works on a carousel principle, with a series of horizontal storage shelves that rotate vertically within an enclosed unit

Materials are placed on the carriers, within suitable bins or trays or straight onto a multipurpose carrier that can be precisely tailored to suit the stock. Individual stock items can then be coded, together with the specific container and shelf location, in line with the safety recommendations. The various shelves can be controlled manually or automatically via an electronic keypad, bar code reader or PC keyboard, giving fast and easier access to the materials required." These type of vertical carousel systems and Shuttle units ( a vertical lift system the contents stored on static shelf locations, when requested, the contents are brought to the operator, at waist height, via a computer controlled extractor) are only limited by the ceiling height of premises, saving significant amounts of space by reducing the footprint (ie space taken up by storage). The organised and hazard free environment that results from installing such a system means workplace regulations are met more effectively and productivity is usually improved.

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