Print for health and safety

Worried about H & S liability? Get a multi-message board!

Safety signage in the workplace is mandatory, but running something off on the copier isn’t going to do it. To ensure compliance with Health & Safety NZ requirements, you need properly designed permanent signs. We can help with that.

Following the Pike River mine incident in 2010, the Health and Safety in Employment Act has had a major overhaul and update. The updated Act, which came into effect in April 2016, aims to reduce New Zealand’s workplace injury and death rate by 25% before 2020.

The Act focuses on controllable factors, based on business risk and size. It’s not just about hazard spotting, it’s about reasonable actions that reduce workplace harm.

This means you need effective health and safety signs in and around your workplace. Your employees and visitors have to be made aware of risks, and nothing does that better than large format multi-message boards, also known as hazard board signs.

What’s a multi-message board?

Positioned near entrances and in communal areas, including visitor reception, multi-message boards let people know about all the major hazards on your site. We produce them on our large format latex press, which has light-fast ink to ensure messaging won’t fade. Safety signage can be printed onto vinyl or directly onto a rigid substrate, such as aluminium composite.

We can go a step further and arrange artwork for your multi-message board with our in-house design resource Soar Studio. Your company branding can be part of the design.

When it comes to H & S compliance, message boards aren’t the only thing we can help you with. We also print:

Wayfinding signage and directory boards. Help people to find their way safely around your site, so they’ll be less likely to end up in hazardous areas.

Large format posters. Wherever your people gather, you have a chance to make them aware of health and safety requirements. Posters are great for this task. They can be put up in lunch rooms, open plan areas and hallways.

Manuals. Capture all the risks, policies and procedures in an easy-to-update loose-leaf manual. You’ll need copies for every employee.

Training materials. You need to educate your people about safe practices. Fact sheets and work sheets can make training more effective.

Hazard stickers. Bright warning stickers to alert people about dangers in the workplace.

For advice about H & S print requirements, email Peter Lloyd at Soar peter@soarprint.co.nz

Read another blog about large format printing.

Five H & S print essentials to help you get your Act together

Now that the long-awaited revised Health & Safety Act is here, keeping your company compliant comes with a whole new level of stress. Have you done enough to manage risk in your workplace?

By printing signage, manuals and posters, we’ve been helping all types of organisations get their H & S Act together. From huge organisations with thousands of employees to micro companies with just one or two workers, every business has to have an active Health and Safety Compliance System in place.

Nobody wants a Worksafe fine

Workplace hazards come with the territory when you’re in the print industry. We have huge, fast-moving machines, lots of heavy lifting, dangerous goods, noise and all sorts of other hazards that must be recognised and managed. Because our industry is relatively hazardous, we’ve become very familiar with the new requirements. Apart from keeping our people safe, we know that doing the right thing helps us to avoid fines.

If you don’t have an active Health and Safety Compliance System in place, here’s what happens if an incident occurs at your workplace:
Worksafe New Zealand will begin an investigation that could result in substantial fines and penalties. You can’t insure for fines and penalties and they can apply to both employer and staff/sub-contractors

Your business insurance cover instantly becomes null and void (eek!)

Print can help

While we’re certainly not health and safety consultants, we can tell you about the H & S printed collateral that’s rolling off our presses. Here are the most popular items:

Large format posters. Wherever your people gather, you have a chance to make them aware of health and safety requirements. Posters are great for this task. They can be put up in lunch rooms, open plan areas and hallways.
Manuals. Capture all the risks, policies and procedures in an easy-to-update loose-leaf manual. You’ll need copies for everyone.
Training materials. When you educate your people about safe practices, fact sheets and work sheets can make training more effective.
Hazard stickers. Bright warning stickers can alert people to dangers in the workplace.
Permanent signage. For hazardous environments, you’ll need permanent signage that reminds workers of what to wear, how to behave and when to report problems.

For help with H & S stuff, we recommend the Team Safety site. You’ll find out about training, e-learning, videos, visitor management and much more.

For advice about H & S print requirements, email Peter Lloyd at Soar peter@soarprint.co.nz