Frequently Asked Questions

You are responsible for the health and safety of everyone affected by your business - including employees, other people working in or visiting your premises (for example, customers, contractors, suppliers or delivery drivers), people affected outside your premises (for example, by emissions) and anyone affected by products or services which you design, produce or supply.

You are also responsible for the welfare of your employees. The requirement to register with your local authority or the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has been abolished. However, depending on the type of business you are operating you may be required to register or obtain a licence to operate under other regulations.

You can check whether your business is required to register or obtain a licence on the HSE website. General health & safety requirements include:

• Having a Health and Safety policy. 

• Carrying out a risk assessment, and taking action to control any risks. 

• Making suitable arrangements for employees' welfare. 

• Taking out Employers Lability Insurance (unless all your employees are your close relatives). 

Specific regulations cover areas such as providing health and safety information, instruction & training to employees, fire precautions, managing dangerous equipment and hazardous substances, providing a suitable working environment, and dealing with accidents and emergencies.

Yes. If you have five or more employees, the policy must be in writing, and you must bring it to the attention of your employees. Even if you have fewer employees, it is good practice to have a written policy.

You have a general duty to make suitable arrangements for employee' welfare - ensuring that you provide the facilities (for example, toilets and drinking water) which are necessary for employees' well-being. This includes considering potential longer-term health risks to your employees as part of your risk assessment.

You must provide appropriate information, instruction and training. You should include health and safety in induction for new employees (or employees moving to a different role), particularly if they will be placed in hazardous situations.

Yes. You are just as responsible for the health and safety of everyone affected by your business, and for the welfare of your employees, as you would be if you ran a factory.

You must get help from a competent person to enable you to meet the requirements of health and safety law. A competent person is someone who has sufficient training and experience or knowledge and other qualities that allow them to assist you properly.

The level of competence required will depend on the complexity of the situation and the particular help you need.

Whether you need expert help will depend on your circumstances and the level of in-house expertise. A small business working from office premises may find it relatively easy to meet its' health and safety obligations but may need initial help to their health and safety actions get up and running.

A business with a factory, by contrast, might need substantial advice on regulations, as well as specialist assistance in assessing specific hazards.

You must provide personal protective equipment or clothing (PPE) whenever there are risks to health and safety which cannot be adequately controlled in any other way. You must provide the PPE free of charge.

You are responsible for ensuring that: the PPE is adequate for the purposes; users are trained to use it properly; the PPE is properly maintained; and that it is correctly stored. You should also ensure that items of PPE are compatible. For example, if an employee must wear a helmet and safety goggles you should ensure they fit securely and are comfortable when worn together.

Ordinary working clothes which do not have a health and safety role (e.g. uniforms) are not covered by these regulations.

Not necessarily - it is the implementation of the policy that counts. You must do more than just pay lip service to health and safety. For example, if you see an employee failing to comply with safety requirements, the employee should be reprimanded and warned that repeated failure will lead to disciplinary action.

Maximum fines are £20,000 and/or one year's imprisonment in less serious cases. However, in more serious prosecutions, fines are unlimited and you could also face up to two years' imprisonment. Fines can be imposed on a company and on individual officers of the company if both are prosecuted.

Directors may also face a disqualification order preventing them from acting as a company director for up to 15 years. Individuals can also be prosecuted for culpable homicide, and manslaughter caused by their gross negligence.

If a person to whom the business owes a duty of care (such as an employee, or a customer) dies as a result of a gross failure in the way health and safety is managed by senior managers in your business, it may be guilty of corporate manslaughter.

The court will look at your systems and processes for managing safety and how these were implemented, and a failure will be treated as gross if it falls far below the standard that could reasonably be expected of your business.

The penalty is an unlimited fine, and the court may also make a publicity order, requiring the business to publicise its conviction and fine, and require it to put right the reasons for its failure.