Causes of Increase Slip and Fall Incidents
On average the food industry has 21 falls per 10,000 full time workers. Severe slip and falls can cost upwards of $30,000 in workers compensation costs. If your fast food franchise is seeing an uptick in slip and falls, one of these five factors is likely to blame. Address these issues and you can get your store back on track.
Failure to enforce shoe policies- many stores have shoe policies that specify what shoes employees should wear but they don't enforce the policy. Be sure that managers are vigilant regarding enforcing your shoe policy.
Oil and water- be sure to check for places and practices that cause excess oil and water on the floor. For instance, are employees dripping oil when refilling oil filters or are they dripping water when dish washing or working with ice or liquids. These falls tend to be the most severe and costly for your workers compensation bottom line because they are not recognized in advance and so the fall is harder and more damaging to the body. As such you want to set up protocols for employees to deal with spills immediately and for managers to survey floors in kitchen regularly.
Everything in its place- are employees being lax about returning items to their proper location, do all items have a proper and functioning storage location. If not, you may have a number of falls related to tripping over items.
Old floor protection- the items meant to protect you can sometimes become the items that harm you. If your floor mats become worn, aren’t sealing to the floor, or are regularly wrinkling, don’t put off replacing them.
Rushing- it is great to have an employee with a sense of urgency, especially if it is to meet the need of a customer. They do call it fast food. However, in a safety first culture, urgency shouldn’t override safety best practices. Company meetings, employee reviews, annual trainings, and signage in break rooms are great opportunities to emphasize this point.
