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The Hand Protection Assessment Survey from Polyco
06 March 2013
Safeguarding your employees & your business

Selecting the most appropriate hand protection will help safeguard your employees against unavoidable hazards and support your organization’s steps towards improved health and safety practices. The Hand Protection Assessment Survey from Polyco is an ideal starting point to ensuring your employees and business are protected from the risk of injury.
With such a wide choice available the process of hand and arm protection selection is becoming increasingly complex. Specialist PPE distributors are therefore calling upon manufacturers with greater frequency to provide hand protection audits and surevys.
A Polyco Hand Protection Assessment Survey will:- provide a documented process to support your risk assessment procedures
- help ensure your organisation complies with the current EN standards and legislation, in particular, "The use of Personal Protective Equipment Directive 89/656/EEC”
- provide a detailed report highlighting the most appropriate specifications of hand and arm protection
- identify the areas where improvements can be made both from a cost and best practice perspective
- will be undertaken by glove industry experts
- will be conducted with no obligation to trial or buy
- will help safeguard against expensive injury claims and time lost due to staff absents through injury
When approaching safety glove selection as part of a Health & Safety risk assessment a Hand Protection Assessment Survey is a good place to start. If a hazard cannot be removed and the risk cannot be avoided, a hand protection survey will help identify suitable protective products in line with current legislation. Polyco offer this comprehensive survey as a free service and is undertaken by experienced industry experts. Following the survey you will be provided with a comprehensive report, identifying the specification of the most suitable hand and arm protection solutions and if appropriate, suggested products for trial.
The danger of over simplifying glove requirementsInjuries can occur when businesses over simplify their glove requirements, seeking a one-glove solution when rarely such an approach is suitable. Different tasks require different types and levels of protection and safety managers and employers need to ensure workers are adequately protected against the full spectrum of risks that they can expect to encounter. A Hand Protection Assessment Survey will help you find the right solution for every task and will minimise duplication and waste.
Helping to get users involvedIt is important to get employees involved. There is a wide variety of safety gloves and arm guards available which combine both high levels of mechanical protection and allow for excellent dexterity. However workers may abandon gloves because they inhibit movement and productivity.
This problem usually occurs when gloves haven’t been trialled or fitted properly, but there are simple steps to avoid this situation. Following a Hand Protection Assessment Survey, we will provide a report of the risks found along with the option to trial recommended products. A trial can be a good way to establish employee support. Not only do trials give the opportunity to involve workers directly in an initiative that will directly affect them, it can also help overcome any pre-formed objections they might have to the usability of the gloves. If a company chooses to trial suggested products, a subsequent user survey can be carried out to establish workers’ feedback which can then feed into the final purchasing decision.
Use quality protectionWhen it comes to procurement, with the PPE market flooded with cheap and often unregulated foreign imports, it might be tempting to try and save money by opting for the ‘cost effective’ option. The effects of the global recession have caused businesses to become more vigilant when it comes to expenditure, but cutting corners in Health and Safety is unacceptable. When tested, many unregulated safety glove products fail the safety standards they are required to meet. Not only do unregulated gloves risk workers’ health and safety, it can cost employers a considerable sum in fines and compensation fees if found in breech of the law.