Lone working risk assessment: a practical guide for UK employers

Who counts as a lone worker?

The Health and Safety Executive defines lone workers as people who work by themselves without close or direct supervision. This can include delivery drivers and mobile engineers; cleaners, caretakers and security staff; employees opening or closing premises; home and community workers; salespeople visiting customers; warehouse staff in isolated areas; home workers; maintenance staff entering remote plant rooms; and people travelling or staying away for work.

An employee does not need to be working in a remote field to be a lone worker. Someone behind a locked door in a town-centre office may still have nobody nearby who can assist them. Lone workers can face greater consequences from ordinary workplace hazards because immediate help or support may not be available.

Lone working may also be occasional. An employee who normally works with colleagues could become a lone worker during an early start, late finish, site visit or temporary absence.

What does the law require?

There is no single piece of legislation called the Lone Working Regulations. The duties arise through wider health and safety law. The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 requires employers to protect employees’ health, safety and welfare so far as reasonably practicable.

The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 require a suitable and sufficient assessment of risks to employees and others affected by the work. Regulation 13 also requires employers to take employees’ health and safety capabilities into account when assigning tasks and to provide adequate training.

Employers managing lone workers must identify hazards, assess risks, provide suitable training and supervision, maintain contact, monitor lone workers and respond effectively if an incident occurs.

The important question is not simply whether a person is allowed to work alone. It is whether this work can be completed safely by this person, in this location, at this time and with these controls.

Some high-risk activities require another person because of specific legal requirements or the need for supervision and rescue arrangements. HSE examples include some confined-space work, work near exposed live electrical conductors, diving operations and fumigation. A lone working risk assessment should decide both how the work can be completed safely and whether it should be completed alone at all.

Why an ordinary risk assessment may not be enough

Lone workers frequently face the same hazards as other employees. The difference is that the consequences may be greater because immediate assistance is unavailable. A minor slip in an occupied office may be noticed immediately; the same fall in an isolated storeroom could leave somebody injured and undiscovered for hours.

The assessment should consider how an incident will be detected, how the employee will summon assistance, how quickly help can realistically arrive, whether the worker can escape, who responds to a missed check-in and whether emergency services can locate and access the worker.

A mobile phone is useful, but it is not a complete lone-working system. The worker may be unconscious, unable to reach it, outside signal coverage or unable to explain their location.

What should a lone worker risk assessment cover?

A generic risk assessment that simply states ‘employee has a mobile phone’ is unlikely to be enough. A meaningful lone worker risk assessment should examine the task, location, individual, contact arrangements and emergency response.

• The task — could the work involve machinery, electricity, hazardous substances, manual handling, work at height or entry into an unfamiliar property? Set clear limits on activities that must not be completed alone.
• The location — consider isolation, mobile signal, security, access, known behaviour, travel, weather and how quickly assistance could arrive. A maintenance visit in Middlesbrough may require different controls from a remote location in Northumberland.
• The individual — consider experience, competence, training and any support needs. Speak to the employee and obtain occupational-health or medical advice where a health condition may affect routine work or an emergency response.
• Contact and monitoring — decide when the employee checks in, who receives it, how they confirm they have left safely and exactly what happens when contact is missed.
• Emergency arrangements — cover injury, illness, threats, assault, vehicle breakdown, inability to leave a property, missed check-ins, alarms and unexpected high-risk situations.

A telephone is not a lone-working system

A mobile phone is a useful tool, but it does not decide who should notice a missed call or what they should do next. Contact intervals should reflect the level of risk. A worker completing a short daytime inspection may not need the same monitoring as somebody working at night, handling cash or visiting a person with a known history of aggression.

Possible controls include scheduled calls, digital check-ins, personal alarms, GPS-enabled devices, supervisor visits and reliable return-to-base arrangements. Whatever system is selected must be understood, tested and acted upon. An alarm that nobody monitors creates reassurance—not protection.

• Agree check-in times and who is responsible for monitoring them.
• Record the worker’s location, itinerary and expected finish time.
• Set an escalation timescale for missed contact.
• Confirm who contacts the worker, manager, emergency contact or emergency services.
• Test alarms, devices, phone coverage and emergency procedures.
• Use a reliable process to confirm that the worker has returned safely.

Set clear limits on working alone

Employees need to know what they can and cannot do without assistance. Pressure to finish a job must not encourage somebody to improvise when conditions change.

An engineer may be authorised to inspect equipment alone but not isolate complex machinery, enter a confined space or perform a lift requiring assistance. Those boundaries should be explicit.

• Identify tasks that are suitable for lone working and those requiring a second competent person.
• Define when work must stop or a manager must authorise continuation.
• Specify what communication, alarm and protective equipment must be available.
• Explain how changes in conditions should be reported.
• Give employees authority to leave or seek help without fear of criticism.

Prepare for foreseeable emergencies

Emergency arrangements should cover foreseeable events including injury, fire, violence, vehicle breakdown and sudden illness. The procedure should explain how and when workers contact the employer, who assumes control and how assistance reaches them.

Depending on the assessment, lone workers may need first-aid equipment, training in administering first aid to themselves, emergency contact details, accurate location information, a means of raising an alarm, access instructions for responders and weather or travel contingencies.

Monitoring and emergency arrangements should be tested rather than assumed to work. A system fails if a missed check-in generates an alert that nobody sees until the following morning.

Violence and aggression must be considered

Employees who deal with customers, tenants, patients or members of the public can face verbal abuse, threats and physical aggression. The risk can increase when somebody is alone, working late, handling money, delivering bad news, enforcing rules or entering a private home.

No single precaution will address every risk. The controls should reflect the work, available information and previous incidents rather than relying on a generic instruction to ‘be careful’.

• Check available information before a visit and share only what the worker needs to stay safe.
• Avoid lone visits, or use two-person visits, where previous behaviour indicates a higher risk.
• Arrange higher-risk appointments during daylight hours where reasonably practicable.
• Provide suitable alarms, communication devices and discreet code words for requesting help.
• Train employees to recognise warning signs, de-escalate where appropriate and withdraw early.
• Give workers clear authority to leave without believing that finishing the job matters more than their safety.

Training and supervision still matter

Lone workers may need additional training because direct guidance is not immediately available when circumstances change. They should understand the hazards, the controls, the limits of what they may do alone and when they must stop and ask for help.

Supervision should be proportionate to the risk and the worker’s ability to recognise and handle problems. New starters, people still in training and employees facing unfamiliar situations may need closer contact or accompanied work before they are ready to work alone.

The common mistake: a policy nobody follows

Many businesses have a lone-working policy stored in a folder. Far fewer can confidently say who is currently working alone, where they are, when they should make contact, who responds if they do not and how long the business waits before escalating.

The paperwork matters, but the working arrangement matters more. Managers should consult the employees who actually work alone. They often know where phone signals disappear, which visits cause concern and where the written process does not match reality.

Review the assessment after an incident, near miss, missed check-in, change of location, new activity or other significant change. Patterns in aggressive behaviour, delayed responses or communication failures should not be dismissed as isolated events.

Seven questions for managers

If any of these answers depends on somebody probably noticing, the lone-working system needs improvement.

• Can this task reasonably be completed alone?
• What could prevent the worker from calling for help?
• How will we know if the employee is overdue or incapacitated?
• Who responds to a missed check-in—and how quickly?
• Can emergency responders locate and access the worker?
• Has the employee been trained and assessed as competent?
• Have we tested the arrangements under realistic conditions?

Lone working risk assessment support across the North East

HR + SAFETY helps employers across Hartlepool, Darlington, Stockton-on-Tees, Middlesbrough, County Durham, Sunderland, Newcastle and the wider North East develop practical lone-working arrangements that match how their people actually work.

We can complete or review your lone working risk assessment, identify tasks that should not be undertaken alone, develop check-in and escalation procedures, assess work-related violence risks, prepare a clear policy, support employee consultation and training, and review incidents or near misses.

Effective controls protect employees, reduce management uncertainty and provide clearer evidence that the business has assessed the risks and implemented a workable response. If your current arrangement is simply ‘call if there is a problem’, speak to HR + SAFETY about putting a reliable system in place.