Health & Safety Signs - 6 Tips for Great Safety Signage
It is now more important than ever to ensure safety procedures and safety signage meet the safety requirements for the workplace. With the number of accidents reported in the workplace it is important to ensure all risks are minimalised for your staff. Improving workplace safety is still a necessary step that all facilities need to adopt.
Clear and effective signage is the most effective way of ensuring a safe workplace. They provide clear visual communication and increase efficiency throughout the facility. But, how do you ensure you get the most out of your safety signs?
Here are seven safety sign practices to help you with that:
1. Place Your Safety Signs Appropriately
Making sure that your safety signs are positioned correctly is essential if they are to be read and understood. Placing Safety signs requires strict adherence to OSHA rules of sign placement:
The rules OSHA state that the signs should be placed as close and as safely as possible to the nearby hazard and must be visible from a distance at least 5 feet away. This ensures that the workers are able to respond to it appropriately before being exposed to the hazard.
Moreover, the sign itself shouldn’t put the workers in more danger by either blocking their view or path of escape. The signs should also have blunt corners without splinters or burrs.
2. Understand OSHA Requirements on Signage
One of the most fundamental safety sign best practices is ensuring the signs and labels in your workplace meet the Occupational Safety Health Act. You can do this by making sure that the color and size of words facilitate easy visibility, even from a distance.
OSHA Signs are classified in four categories – Danger, Warning, Caution, and Notice — depending on the severity of workplace hazard. Each category has a unique color and style. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) sets standards for workplaces to keep employees and visitors safe. Our Safety Signs communicate those safety regulations to prevent accidents and injuries.
3. Types of Safety Signs
Understanding the different types of safety signs allows you to use them correctly for the probable safety hazards.
The four compulsory UK workplace safety signs, which are: emergency exits, fire safety, prohibition and road traffic regulation signs. These four types of signs can then be split up into four different groups:
Emergency
Warning
Prohibition
Mandatory
Other common types of safety signage include:
Notices: Instructions and rules that should be adhered to help minimize the risks of accidents.
Admittance: Alerts that explain the dangers associated with entering the restricted area.
Non-Hazard Signs: These signs communicate general safety messages such as the nearest exits points and fire assembly points.
5. Customize Your Safety Signs
Depending on your work environment, you may need more than the common types of safety signs. Fortunately, OSHA allows the customization of safety signs to meet your industrial needs.
However, when designing the signs, ensure that they’re compliant with the pre-set guidelines on how to design signs.
Basically, the sign should always start with a header that signals the level of alertness such as Danger, Warning, Caution, or Notice. A graphic safety symbol should follow, and after that, the message panel should be below.
To avoid confusion the signs should be consistent in their design throughout your facility.
6. Sign Quality and Longevity
The physical condition of your safety signs is incredibly important. Poor quality signage site-wide may mean that vital safety notices are illegible and could also give visitors the impression that safety is an afterthought or isn’t taken as seriously as it should be. If you’ve seen a sign on-site that’s faded or broken and you haven’t recently reviewed your signage, it’s likely that there are more that have suffered the same fate.
Low quality catalogue bought signs are the most susceptible to fading as they are often screen printed and manufactured using low quality materials.
Here at Signs, Safety & Surveys, we only produce our signs using the best quality vinyl, laminates and materials combined with state-of-the-art digital latex printing; our 7 year grade polymeric self-adhesive vinyl and matched UV resistant laminate system prevents fading for at least 7 years.
If your signs are fading we would advise you book an inspection immediately to evaluate and work to rectify your facility’s signs.
7. Combined Safety Signage
We see all too often that people put up too many signs in one place. Granted, all the required notices may be present, but having lots of signs can be overwhelming and confusing for staff. This is called “sign blindness”. You can avoid this mistake by taking down all of those signs and replacing them with one board, which combines all of the signs in one place clearly to understand. See an example of this below:
Improve Your Employees’ Safety With Us Today
Even though accidents are unpredictable, using safety signs has proven to be an effective method of minimising workplace accidents.
They help keep the employees safe which in turn makes them productive by knowing their safety is prioritised. You also won’t have to deal with any downtime caused by unforeseen emergencies. To guarantee the effectiveness of the safety signs and labels, be sure to follow the seven tips above.
If you’re looking at perfecting your site’s safety signage, book a site audit with us today:
Call: 01580 388 016/017
Email: info@s-s-sltd.co.uk
