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No Throwaway Hiviz Solutions
16 February 2005
Company Clothing Magazine Feature, February 2005
Paying lip service to high visibility regulations is both a waste of money and could put staff in danger. Cost-effective alternatives are out there.
If your employees wear high visibility garments then regulation 7 of The Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulation 1992 should hold no surprises for you. ‘Every employer shall ensure that any personal protective equipment provided to his employees is maintained (including replaced or cleaned as appropriate) in an efficient state, in an efficient working order and in good repair.’ But according to PHS Hiviz marketing manager Vicky O’Brian, this message is still not getting through effectively, resulting in a monumental waste of money with high-visibility clothing being regularly replaced with new garments rather than cleaned and repaired to BS EN 471 standards.
The purpose of a high visibility garment is to ensure that the wearer can be seen at times of low visibility, however the reality of daily wear, means that garments soon become dirty and damaged. The natural tendency when this happens, is to replace the garment at what can be a considerable cost. And that, says Vicky, is a waste of money when for a tenth of the price it can be professionally cleaned and repaired.
The mathematical sums aren’t difficult for example High vis foul weather jackets – the good quality ones that is – can cost over £100, and if washed at home in domestic machines, the process will damage the reflective tape (due to the temperatures and detergents used) shortening the lifespan of the garment by reducing its inherent safety properties. The Hiviz process carefully controls the temperature of both the washing and drying process, and uses special detergents (which are also environmentally friendly), to protect the garments (with particular focus on the reflective tape) being laundered whilst removing heavy soiling.
From its headquarters in Caerphilly, South Wales, PHS Hiviz offers a maintenance service for high visibility garments, ensuring employers are complying with Health and Safety regulations, while avoiding having to replace dirty high visibility clothing when it is too dirty or damaged. And it saves money. ‘We have different pricing for different garments,’ explains Vicky. ‘obviously the cost of a new foul weather jacket will be considerably different to that of a high vis vest, and that is reflected in our laundering charges”.
The Hiviz process provides a weekly turnaround and begins with garments being collected from the site by a dedicated driver. If being collected for the first time, garments are bar coded with site and wearer details (for track and trace purposes), inspected, repaired or altered if necessary, cleaned, dried, inspected again, folded and packed and then delivered. Any garment found to be damaged beyond repair during the inspection process, is sent back to the wearer with a condemned notice, informing them that the garment is no longer fit for purpose and that they should contact their supervisor for a replacement.
PHS Hiviz began this service about a year and a half ago, and it now it numbers Network Rail, Balfour Beatty, Jarvis and EWS among its customers and these equate to around 700 sites. Unfortunately companies such as these have many different divisions, each of which have to be convinced of the benefits of the managed service. ‘It is not easy. The whole point is that it is a safety issue, and maintaining the garments is part of the process. Most potential customers know about it and want to sort it out, but they never get round to it.’
Those that do sign up to the service tend to be the most safety conscious, and as such, the vast majority sign up to an optional management reporting feature. ‘If someone has an accident while wearing a high vis garment, the bar code will provide the information of when it was last cleaned and what its status would be when the accident happened (i.e. if it had been condemned etc). It effectively provides an audit trail.’
On a day to day basis, employers can check which employees at a site are using the service and who aren’t, and if necessary take action. ‘The regularity with which a garment is received, totally depends on the job that is being carried out i.e. how dirty the wearers environment is. The thinking behind it is that wearers put the garment in for laundering in when its dirty, and safety is being compromised. So employers are only charged for garment laundering as and when they are received into the service’
And some of the garments that do arrive, says Vicky, are in a shocking state. ‘Sometimes they are so soiled that the reflective tape is almost invisible. In a real life situation, if an employee were wearing the garment you may not see them until it was too late.’ The challenge is making the end users aware of the safety implications. ‘For a lot of them they get changed at work and they don’t think what state their clothing is in, until it is so soiled it is almost completely black!’
There are further incentives to using the service. Garments are also automatically reproofed and reflameproofed as standard. And there is no pressure to purchase high visibility garments from Hiviz, says Vicky – most of her customers, she assures, use their own garments
Besafe