Pay Attention… To Your Clips.

An article in the news a few weeks caught my eye; Hospital safety standards shocking, say inspectors.

Apparently, four out of five NHS hospitals had ‘safety standards were not good enough.’

In a hospital, I understand that sentiment. Patients come there to get better; anything less than top quality care isnt acceptable.

But who is responsible in an office? Or a warehouse? Britain has been accused of taking the health and safety trend too far. Yet with all the measures put in place and how many accidents still occur, one wonders if there is any point to it all. Safety is extremely important, in every industry. Keeping staff and patrons safe is part of your responsibilities as a business owner.

No matter, how many safety measures you deploy, accidents still occur.

Take a standard warehouse, for example, the warehousing industry in the UK has these eye-opening statistics in worker injuries:

• 130 workers were killed at work
• Over 70, 000 other injuries to employees were reported under RIDDOR
• 629 000 injuries occurred at work, of which 148 000 led to over-7-days absence

Many of these are easily preventable. While it is important to have excellent equipment and machinery, how many people talk about personal responsibility and negligence? Staff are rarely held responsible for accidents; everyone tries to blame the management when accidents occur.

But the management provided training, PPE and codes of conduct at work. Yet some members of staff still do dangerous things like riding on the forklift tines, going over the specified speed limit, ignoring the clearly marked walkways. Negligence is the primary cause of accidents in the workplace.

This stance may not be shared by everyone, but personal responsibility is sadly missing in many workplaces across Britain. I was a visitor at a distribution facility in Birmingham, the other day. In the middle of the tour, I noticed the clips on a particularly long pallet beam were bent out of shape. Calling the attention of the nearest staff member to it, he simply shrugged and walked away. I had to speak to the manager of the shift and point it out to him.

It may seem trivial but something as small as a shelf clip can make or mar a shift. Think about it; your pallet racks are built to carry the products you manufacture or distribute. Ranging from car parts weighing a few hundred kilograms to freshly cut, ready to be planted baby palm trees. What would be the outcome if such a rack collapsed? Even worse, if it collapsed on a worker or visitor.

Like I said, negligence is the main cause of workplace accidents. We all know pallet racks suffer bumps and scrapes especially, from not-so-careful forklift drivers. This bumping leads to weakening of the integrity of the structure. Add the ignoring of the signs showing the load bearing weight of the pallet and you have a recipe for disaster.

The progressive increase in weight on the beams weigh on the clips at the ends which hold the beams to the frame. As they deform and bend, they cause the beams to sag. Most times, this small but important components are the only thing keeping pallets upright, (literally) and your business ticking on.

Different racks use different clip shapes and sizes. This can present a problem when you need to replace them. This problem is solved by using the Universal pallet rack safety Drop Pin. If you use a lot of refurbished racking, you may not have access to all of it’s original components, as they may have been discontinued. The Universal Pallet Rack Safety Drop Pin fits into most 3/8 wide holes and helps hold your racking system up. Another popular is the Ridg-U-Rak Pallet Rack Spring Clip. From the popular manufacturer, this clip is unique as it can secure two levels of beams in separate bays.

Other clips include Ridg-U-Rak Pallet Rack CL Clip, SpaceRak Pallet Rack Clip New Style, Bulldog Pallet Rack Beam Clip, Steel King pallet racking Beam Clip Teardrop etc. As tiny as they are, clips play an important part in your warehouse efficiency. Improvising or abandoning the use of a clip all together is an expensive lawsuit waiting to happen. Don’t be caught short; protect your staff, customers and business. Carrying out safety rack inspections and having a standby supplier of clips is vital to your business.

New and refurbished clips are available for sale at Monarch Shelving Limited.

Packaged in convenient lot sizes of 50, you can buy the exact clip needed to hold your rack in place or a more universal option. Call us today and let us help you hold it all together.