The device is intended for use on a daily basis to ensure surfaces are within the legal requirement, as a litigious tool for recording important details when a slipping accident occurs and, by using the memory facility, will identify potential risks in the future – enabling evasive action prior to accidents and claims.
The introduction of the European DIN 51130 slip standard for commercial and public areas and the C1028 standard in the United States of America are being vigorously enforced and compensation claim sizes are growing.
The UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE), which has adopted the European DIN 51130 test standard, recently provided statistics indicating that there is a slipping accident at work every 3 seconds, many of which result in work absence. Furthermore, the HSE now state that the ‘duty of care’ imposed on a company under current legislation can be applied to the directors, general manager or supervisor of the area and that neglect of such duty can lead to a personal as well as corporate prosecution in the event of an accident.
- Financial costs to UK employers alone total £512million per annum for loss of employee production due to slips at work
- The cost to the National Health Service is £133 million per annum treating 10,500 individuals for serious broken bones due to slips
- Insurance claims and compensation has reached £800 million per annum for slip related accidents
- 37% of all accidents in the work place are slip related the largest single number of reported accidents
The UK Health & Safety Executive (similar to other worldwide bodies) have strict conditions that the owners of floors, used by employees and the general public, must ensure the surface is safe for use in wet and dry conditions.
If accidents occur and the “Duty of Care” requirement has been compromised legal action has and will be taken.
When a slipping accident takes place it is difficult to state whether the floor was at fault, the user, contamination on the surface or if it was a spurious occurence. With the Slip Guardian device on site it is ready to use at the touch of a button and will take away the guess work for the property owner and ultimately insurance companies.
An additional problem is that cleaning staff and materials add to the epidemic levels of slipping accidents. They use incorrect methods to clean floors and leave chemical residues on the surface without the knowledge of the danger they are creating.
Slip Guardian is designed to be operated by cleaning staff to identify if they are carrying out the correct method of cleaning, as well as being able to see any long term degradation of the floor surface. Owners and managers will be able to view statistics that mean they can take the necessary action of altering cleaning regimes, staff, materials etc. Click here to see Slip Guardian in operation.
A major problem however is that to measure just one critical parameter of a floor, the unit is heavy and bulky, requires considerable training to operate, is expensive to buy, recording is made on pen and paper and requires nearly half an hour to set up.
The Slip Guardian uses the exact same rubber friction shoe component over the same path as the Pendulum. The big difference is that instead of a mechanical pointer, our system uses opto-electronic sensors to measure the energy change and an inbuilt processor to calculate the coefficient of friction. Slip Guardian also measures the surface gloss and surface temperature. Readings appear instantly on the electronic display and can be stored or transmitted to a remote server for analysis and reporting. It weighs less than 5 kilos and is easily transported in its own carrying case. Power comes from internal rechargeable batteries.
