Tackling certain health and safety issues in your workplace could help you minimise your insurance claims and could keep the cost of premiums down.

In fact you might find that your insurance company asks you to make specific changes to your business to meet Health and Safety Executive regulations before they'll cover you.

Make no mistake, it can be well worth making any changes recommended by your insurer, especially when the latest figures from the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) estimates that more than 24 million workdays are lost each year by firms failing to implement basic health and safety procedures.

The same survey also revealed that workplace accidents are costing UK businesses about £2.5 billion in lost trade every year. Meanwhile the Health and Safety Executive estimates the average cost to a business of the serious injury of an employee is somewhere between £17,000 and £19,000.

So what can you do to help keep those premiums down?

• All businesses with five or more employees need to set up a written health and safety policy and a health and safety management system.
• This is the first step towards making sure your workplace is safe for you and your employees. Even if your business seems to be relatively hazard free there will still be issues that need to be addressed, such as keeping fire exits clear.
• Make sure employees are involved in creating your health and safety policy and that they're given a copy of the document. The policy should make it clear exactly who's responsible for every aspect of health and safety.
• You should also carry out a health and safety risk assessment. This will involve putting into place prevention and control measures once you've identified any hazards.
• Revise your health and safety policy regularly; your business situation may well change.
• Do what's necessary to make sure the policy is being followed and discipline employees that violate the policy.

Bradshaw Bennett have appointed two specialist partners to work together in addressing your health and safety and employment law needs. Whether this is as simple as a health check to ensure continuing compliance or the complete drafting of a bespoke Health & Safety Policy.

Our partners will be able to provide:

• an audit of your current Health & Safety policy. A detailed report is prepared highlighting areas of concern and practical solutions that will reduce both risk and cost;
• risk assessments covering all aspects of your business ;
• a bespoke Health & Safety policy tailored to meet your company requirements;
• a risk improvement service to enable compliance with Insurers' regulations;
• a post-accident investigation service whereby accidents are fully investigated, reported and reviewed in light of current existing procedures;
• an audit of Employment Law / Health & Safety / HR procedures
• the Design & Production of Terms & Conditions of Employment for each employee
• the Design & Production of Staff  Handbooks (taken from initial audit)
• the Production of any required Forms & Records (Self Cert Form, Application for Employment etc)
• guidance through Staff Disciplinary / Grievance procedures
• holiday, Maternity or Paternity, SSP, Notice Pay calculations
• redundancy, TUPE and Employment Tribunal support