Most companies transitioned to remote working on a dime. One week, everyone is at their office desks. The next week, they’re at their kitchen tables and spare bedrooms. But what many employers fail to recognize in that immediacy is that home workers are at entirely different safety risks than those working in corporate settings.
We’re not just talking about bad desk chairs or misshapen monitor heights, either. No, these safety risks are more serious than that.
The Issue with Being Unseen
Someone gets into an accident in an office because someone is in the office. Someone falls. Someone is having a heart attack. This may not seem relevant as their co-workers are focused on their own tasks, but ultimately, enough people are moving through the office space that someone sees something – or someone is sitting close enough nearby that they notice a health crisis taking place.
This is the first problem with remote working safety. Without anyone around, a home-based employee can fall, have a heart attack, get into a medical emergency and no one would ever know. They’re not going to be found at some desk with a coworker walking by. There is no one who will be asked to get something for the injured party who then collapses before they finish asking for help on the phone. This isn’t the avoidability of safety risk, either, it’s an entirely different context to where unless policy changes, no one would ever know.
Employer Responsibility Remains the Same Regardless of Location
Employers must still have a duty of care for employees as much as they’re working virtually as they would if in an office in Seattle. The Health and Safety at Work Act is clear there are no exceptions for home-based employees. However, how employers can fulfill those obligations change entirely.
For businesses that operate remote teams, it’s not optional to have systems put in place. Those advocating for safe solutions will often rely on this home-worker safety guide to understand what comprehensive protection really means and how best to go about ensuring it across disbanded workforces effectively.
It’s not just throwing a laptop at someone and saying they’re good to go. There has to be a check-in process, an emergency response, a way for lone workers to communicate if something’s gone wrong.
Why Office Safety Doesn’t Translate
Someone goes into work to an office one day for a meeting, and there’s fire alarms, a first aid kit, designated fire wardens, and emergency evacuation procedures. Someone is responsible for evaluating the alarm systems; everyone is apprised of fire drills; there’s a health and safety officer assessing risk.
None of this happens inside someone’s home.
Home workers are navigating situations not meant for working access, there’s protruding wires they never realized were there. They have to find an escape route up a steep set of stairs. They’re living in a multiple tenant complex with faulty smoke detectors from years ago because the landlord hasn’t updated anything since before they moved in.
But employers are not subjected to any control on this. You can’t mandate building improvements for someone living in a rented space, but if they get hurt doing work for you, you’re still responsible.
The Psychological Safety Risk Nobody Talks About
Physical safety is always discussed first, but there’s an equally relevant mental health risk associated with home working safety like no other. It’s isolating as all get out. People can go days without seeing another face for direct conversation.
This isn’t because someone may be introverted or extroverted; this is simply being in one’s headspace for prolonged periods without any social interaction. It’s psychologically proven to disrupt cognitive function, create more anxiety over time and foster depressive symptoms or additional mental health concerns.
If a person’s mental health declines, their physical safety becomes compromised, too, if they’re falling down the stairs while sleep deprived because they haven’t taken care of their own needs since they haven’t seen anyone else to deter negative feelings and actions.
Regular check-ins help, but check-ins that matter. A weekly team call that asks for status updates doesn’t mean squat if there’s no meaningful interaction and no way for people to communicate that they’re struggling.
Communication Failures and Emergency Response
One of the scenarios every employer with remote working employees fears most is when a medical emergency occurs at home during working hours. How long until someone realizes that something’s gone wrong? How will help get there?
In an office space, someone’s absence from a meeting may raise questions as someone may go check on them to see what’s happened. If someone topples over at their cubicle it becomes clear, immediately. At home, they could miss three meetings before someone thinks something’s up, and even then, what’s the protocol? Who knows where they live? Who has clearance to call EMS or do a welfare check?
These are not hypothetical concerns; this happens all the time. Employers without policies in place scramble with what to do while all their employee needs is immediate assistance.
Technological Solutions That Do Work
Some employers utilize monitoring systems for lone workers, from check ins with requests to panic buttons to apps that show someone hasn’t moved in over an hour. This can benefit remote workers by providing immediate access if anything goes wrong.
But technology isn’t the only solution; it requires systems in place that create cultural awareness where the workers know why they’re checking in and then what an emergency consists of versus when to use the network; there has to be someone on the other end who responds proactively to alerts.
Risk Assessments Are Important
The employers who are smart will do risk assessments for home offices like any office space assessment otherwise would occur. This means having employees assess their space, potential hazards and what safety equipment is available (or which ones they do not possess).
These cannot be bureaucratic assessments just to check off boxes – they need to mean something in real time. If the worker possesses a working smoke detector; if there’s a first aid kit; if electrical outlets are overloaded; if there needs to be lighting for workspace; if there needs to be quick action/evac situation.
Employers might need to provide equipment based upon these assessments, a fire extinguisher, certain desk setups, lighting, even means to contribute toward making the space safer; yes, this costs money; so do workplace injuries and legal issues stemming from neglected duty of care.
Make Policies That Acknowledge Reality
The best home worker safety policies genuinely appreciate that you cannot control everything. You cannot make someone’s unit or house safe like one meant for only work purposes; however, you can set systems in place that allow for someone to notice should things go wrong.
This means established lines of communication; welfare assessments; training on recognizing hazards within home spaces; emergency protocols that allow it to happen; if anything should go wrong (and how); and that there’s not stigma should employees raise those concerns based upon fears that they’ll be forced back into offices since no one else is there anyway.
What Should Happen
In order to protect home workers safely, businesses need a revamped approach entirely about workplace safety. It’s easier not to change office-related plans into virtual setups; it makes more sense from the ground up with new frameworks.
This includes investing in proper lone worker technology and tracking apps; training up managers for visibility into potential isolation concerns; making equity check-in systems effective; assessing emergency contact protocols and most importantly, taking remote worker safety as seriously as office worker safety.
The reality is that we’re past the point of no return, remote working isn’t going away, those companies that can find remote access safe for their home workers will have better outcomes down the line, in fewer injuries sustained, improved mental health for work outputs, productivity heightened volume, and literally, a workforce who trusts their employers enough to keep them safe from harm with effective implementation, compared to no system decided until ultimately, one wakes up with regrettable news.
