The next step

Pallet racking

[Checklist]

To SEMA

[Weblink]

The HSE's guidance on racking

[Document]

How to inspect your racking

The legal setting

Under the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 employers must routinely inspect any work equipment, such as pallet racking, which could deteriorate or be damaged. Racking tends to be abused in a busy environment and staff may not appreciate the risk until disaster strikes and the whole rack collapses into the aisle. To avoid this situation the Storage Equipment Manufacturers’ Association (SEMA) provides advice and training on racking safety. At the end of 2017 it updated its published recommendations.

Who’s in charge?

If you have storage racking in your business, it’s advised that you allocate overall responsibility for its safety to one individual. Their duty is to maintain safe operation of the racking, its inspection and records of maintenance. In order to be able to fulfil their role they must possess the necessary skills to carry out inspections, identify any damage and report/analyse damage data. They must also have the authority to suggest and enforce any action needed to manage and rectify defects.

Recommended inspections

SEMA suggests you implement three types of inspection:

1. Immediate reporting of any damage or reasons for concern. The information should be reported to the manager who has been allocated the responsibility for racking safety.
2. Regular inspections carried out by someone trained in racking inspection.
3. Expert inspection, e.g. by a SEMA-approved racking inspector working for your racking supplier.

Tip 1. The HSE fully endorses the SEMA approach including the use of their training courses, approved installers scheme and inspection recommendations. In fact, it advises the same approach in its own published guidance for storage safety. The HSE’s guidance is available free of charge (see The next step ).

Tip 2. The latest version of the guidance moves away from rigid timeframes of daily and weekly inspections and replaces these with the words “immediate” and “regular”. However, if you run a busy warehouse, stick with the daily/weekly frequency.

Tip 3. If your staff carry out regular inspections, to ensure competency, put them through a Rack Safety Awareness course. For training courses and materials, visit the SEMA website (see The next step ).

On completion of this inspection a documented report should identify any damage, give guidance, and comment on other warehouse activities (see The next step ).

Tip 4. Working at height shouldn’t be necessary for weekly and daily inspections as are usually visual checks completed from ground level.

Tip 5. Train all warehouse staff to report any defects or damage immediately.

For the HSE’s guidance on racking, a link to SEMA and our pallet racking checklist, visit http://tipsandadvice-healthandsafety.co.uk/download (HS 16.15.06).