Excuses for employees not wearing PPE at work
Making sure that your workplace is safe should be a top priority, but the persistent issue of employees not wearing Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) remains a significant concern for both workers and employers. How often have you encountered excuses from employees for not correctly using PPE equipment?
Understanding the risks and legal obligations surrounding PPE is crucial. PPE, such as safety glasses, hearing protection, and respirators, are designed to minimize exposure to workplace hazards. While PPE doesn’t eliminate hazards entirely, it significantly reduces the risk of illnesses and injuries from these hazards.
For instance, correctly worn hearing protection reduces the potential hearing damage caused by being near loud machinery, even though it doesn’t silence the noise itself. In Canada, safety legislation mandates PPE use, making it more than just a best practice.
What is Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)?
Before we get into the reasons that employees might not be wearing PPE, let’s briefly chat about what PPE is. Personal Protective Equipment, or PPE, refers to any clothing, equipment, or substances designed to protect workers from workplace hazards.
These hazards can range from physical injuries and chemical exposures to airborne contaminants and noise. PPE acts as a barrier between the worker and the hazard, minimizing the risk of injury, illness, or even death.
Common examples of PPE include safety glasses, hard hats, respirators, gloves, and hearing protection. It’s important to remember that PPE is the last line of defense. Ideally, hazards should be eliminated or controlled to the best of your ability.
Common excuses for not wearing PPE at work
Not wearing PPE at work is a serious risk as it helps keep workers healthy and safe. PPE serves as a barrier to minimizing exposure to a wide array of workplace hazards. However, despite its vital role in preventing injuries and illnesses, you may still frequently run into a range of excuses from employees who are not using PPE correctly.
These excuses range from forgetfulness to outright refusal and come from all kinds of workers. Many employers already emphasize educating new and young workers about the importance of PPE, but experienced workers also come up with excuses.
While they might seem like no big deal, these excuses can actually shine a light on some bigger safety problems you need to deal with. So, instead of just brushing them off, let’s take a closer look at what these common excuses really mean, and how you can use them to make your workplace safer for everyone. Let’s examine seven common excuses for not wearing PPE and how you can respond.
The excuse: “I didn’t know”
Workers may say they didn’t know they had to wear PPE, so providing comprehensive health and safety training ensures workers know what PPE to wear and when. Provide information and training about PPE at the start of employment as part of your onboarding process.
Use a Safety Orientation Checklist to ensure employees receive all information and training required to work safely. Also, consider implementing a Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) Policy to set expectations for when workers must wear PPE. Have workers sign and date the policy to acknowledge they have reviewed and agreed to the terms so you can hold them accountable.
It’s also important to communicate any new or updated requirements for wearing PPE. Changes may occur following regular workplace hazard assessments. Use a New or Updated Policy Communication Memo to ensure workers are aware of the updated requirements and to create a record of the communication.
If the change requires a new type of PPE, also provide workers with training on how, when, and why to use it. This training ensures workers know when they need to wear their PPE, but it doesn’t guarantee they won’t forget.
The excuse: “I forgot.”
Workers may forget to wear their PPE, but this can be corrected promptly if workers are properly supervised. Supervisors need to take health and safety matters seriously, including wearing PPE.
Assign occupational health and safety awareness training to supervisors and ensure they are aware of the importance of their responsibilities. These responsibilities include leading by example by wearing PPE themselves, enforcing PPE requirements by actively addressing those who are not complying and ensuring proper use and maintenance of all PPE equipment. Also consider other simple changes you can make to reduce forgetfulness.
For instance, if workers share company-provided PPE, make it easily accessible and visible, such as leaving coats and gloves outside the door of a walk-in freezer. Workers may genuinely forget their PPE on occasion. If this becomes a pattern of behaviour, implement progressive discipline in accordance with your Progressive Discipline Policy. You need to take health and safety violations seriously.
Remember, wearing PPE is mandated by legislation where an employer requires it, and it is vital to protecting employees’ health and safety. However, issues like poor fit can also deter employees from wearing PPE.
The excuse: “It doesn’t fit.”
Poorly fitting PPE can prevent workers from wearing it properly and compromise its effectiveness. PPE is not one size fits all; it needs to fit the individual properly to provide adequate protection. Factors like body size, sex, and gender are all important considerations for finding the right fit.
If you provide PPE, ensure many sizes are available to employees. If the employee is responsible for providing their own PPE, supply them with criteria for how PPE should fit so that they can ensure they select the correct size.
Some types of PPE even require individual fit testing by professionals, such as respirators. Poorly fitting PPE doesn’t only compromise its effectiveness, but it can become a hazard itself. For example, oversized clothing can become tangled in a machine and pull the worker in, resulting in injury.
Poor fit, among other factors, can also contribute to PPE being uncomfortable to wear: for example, if it’s too small and overly restricts movement.
The excuse: “It’s uncomfortable.”
No one wants to wear uncomfortable equipment. Discomfort can stem from various factors, which can be identified using a Personal Protective Equipment Survey. A common source of discomfort is having to wear multiple types of PPE at once.
Where this is required, employers need to ensure all types of PPE can be worn together comfortably without compromising effectiveness. Maintaining PPE and replacing it as necessary can also improve comfort. For example, fabric may become scratchy with prolonged use and require workers to make frequent adjustments, which could compromise the PPE’s effectiveness.
Also consider how work conditions affect comfort. If workers are exposed to high temperatures, implement a prevention plan as part of your Heat Stress Prevention and Hot Weather Policy. This plan should include administrative controls, such as allowing workers to take more frequent breaks and remove PPE during these breaks to reduce the risk of heat stress.
The excuse: “It slows me down.”
Even when PPE fits properly, it can be cumbersome to wear. Employers should acknowledge that while wearing PPE may seem inconvenient, it is a crucial health and safety measure. PPE should be a key consideration when planning jobs in accordance with the company’s Health and Safety Planning Policy to ensure workers use it where necessary.
Workers may feel that wearing PPE makes it take longer to complete tasks or inhibits them from working efficiently. For example, workers may feel that wearing gloves when working on certain machinery limits dexterity. While it’s great that employees want to be productive, employers should foster a safety culture where workers know that safety always comes first.
Organizational Culture Training can help you assess your current culture and take steps to promote a culture of safety. Supervisors can also contribute to building a safety culture as part of their duties under a Supervisor Competencies and Responsibilities Policy.
Supervisors should lead by example and always wear their PPE, which can encourage employees to do the same and work safely. Even with a strong safety culture, employers might need to make accommodations regarding PPE.
The excuse: “It violates my rights.”
If an employee’s reason for not wearing PPE is based on a prohibited ground of discrimination under applicable human rights legislation, you have a duty to accommodate them in accordance with your Human Rights Policy.
For example, workers who wear religious head coverings and are required to wear hard hats may request accommodation. Accommodation does not mean allowing an employee to work without wearing PPE. It means providing PPE in a different form that still provides adequate protection.
Follow the accommodation process to identify an appropriate accommodation and document it in an Individual Accommodation Plan. It is also important to note there is a limitation on the duty to accommodate if PPE is a bona fide occupational requirement (BFOR).
Making accommodations regarding PPE helps ensure that workers remain safe and respect their human rights. Accommodation is not required if the refusal is not based on a prohibited ground under human rights legislation, such as “I just don’t want to.”
The excuse: “I don’t want to.”
Employees may not want to wear required PPE, but it’s not optional. It’s a legislated requirement and key to protecting their health and safety. Occupational health and safety legislation mandates workers wear PPE where it is required by an employer.
When and where PPE is to be worn should appear clearly under employee responsibilities in your Health and Safety Policy. If a worker refuses to wear PPE where required, they cannot be permitted to work. They are violating company policy and occupational health and safety legislation. The worker should be subject to progressive discipline in accordance with your Progressive Discipline Best Practice Guide.
Employees may argue that they have never worn it, and nothing has happened. This argument illustrates that the employee does not understand the importance of PPE and how it makes work safer. Try to educate your employees on the importance of PPE by assigning Personal Protective Equipment Training for Employees and using track training assignments so you know when it’s time for another refresher.
It’s also important to provide job and task-specific training on the hazards employees face and how wearing PPE protects them. This can help employees see PPE as a tool that helps complete a job safely, like a ladder is a tool to reach something out of place.
Corrective action for not wearing PPE
Workers’ excuses for not wearing PPE can reveal underlying issues. It can also help to explain why workers don’t take this important health and safety measure. Many of these issues are relatively easy to address. Addressing these issues proactively is essential to creating a safer work environment. Let’s break this down a bit to help you address any excuses that might pop up in the future.
Identifying and addressing root causes
It’s crucial to look beyond the surface-level excuses and identify the root causes of why employees are not complying with PPE rules. Common underlying issues include:
- Lack of training and awareness: Workers may not fully understand the risks involved or how PPE protects them.
- Discomfort or poor fit: Poor fitting or uncomfortable PPE can make employees now want to use it.
- Perceived inconvenience: Workers may find PPE annoying or time-consuming.
- Peer pressure or misconceptions: A culture of non-compliance can influence individual behavior.
- Not enough PPE available or poor maintenance: Damaged or unavailable PPE creates barriers to its use.
Implementing effective corrective measures
Addressing these root causes requires a strategic approach. Try to start by focusing on education, improvement, and reinforcement. Here are some ideas to consider when addressing corrective actions:
- Comprehensive training and refreshers: Ongoing training should highlight the importance of PPE, proper usage, and potential consequences of non-compliance.
- PPE selection and fit assessments: Employers should involve workers in selecting comfortable, well-fitting PPE and conduct regular fit assessments.
- Regular PPE inspections and maintenance: Ensure PPE is readily available, properly maintained, and replaced when necessary. You should be inspecting PPE at least monthly and replacing anything that needs to be replaced immediately.
Shifting the mindset about PPE
The ultimate goal of corrective action should be to shift workers’ mindsets and reduce PPE non-compliance. It is always better to educate than punish. Try to get your employees to understand why PPE is needed rather than them fearing the consequences of not wearing it.
Encourage communication and feedback too. Giving your employees a safe space to voice their concerns and report any issues will go a long way. You can even reward this type of behaviour to encourage it in the future.
Do you need help getting compliant?
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