Caught – firm fined £9,000 for failing to regularly maintain forklifts

An animal feed supplier has been fined for safety failings after the company had failed to ensure their fork lift trucks had undergone regular examination, putting employees at risk.

Equipment that requires a statutory examination should have a 12-monthly check to ensure they are safe to be in operation. This must be carried out within the correct timescales by a suitably competent person. This offence is equivalent to driving a motor vehicle without an MOT.

Fork lift trucks are involved in many fatalities, accidents and near misses, those which have not been thoroughly examined in line with the statutory requirements can put the users and those working in the vicinity of the trucks at higher risk of injury than they need to be.

Gardners Limited, of Baveney Farm, Shropshire was fined a total of £9,000, and ordered to pay £1,150 in costs after pleading guilty to an offence under Section 9(3)(a) of the Lifting Operation and Lifting Equipment Regulations 1998.

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