As New Jersey residents may know, employees take necessary precautions to avoid accidents while working in a warehouse or factory. Even more safety considerations may be necessary if an employee is working alone in such a setting.
It is common in jobs such as maintenance, security and late-night repairs for an employee to work alone. While normally a group working together may look out for one another, a lone worker will not have that benefit. It may be a good idea for a business to develop guidelines for those employees working alone.
One way to help protect solitary workers is to monitor the employee’s movements through the use of a mobile device. In addition, it may be wise to do a risk assessment on the safety of the particular type of work done by the lone employee.
Having a plan in place in the event of emergency gives an employee guidelines on how to respond appropriately. Scheduled communication by radio with an employee working alone combined with an alarm set to go off in the event the employee is out of contact beyond an expected period of time may increase safety. In addition, businesses may choose to delegate safer tasks to lone workers and leave the more challenging jobs for when multiple workers are on board.
A worker injured on the job may face medical bills, lost time from work and a long recovery period. Speaking with an attorney in this event may be beneficial. An attorney may advise an injured worker about specific workers’ compensation laws and assist in filing a claim or an appeal if the original claim is denied.