As an employer, you have a duty of care towards your employees and you must take health and safety issues seriously. A vital part of any health and safety regime is ensuring that your team can be clearly seen at all times while they are working. If your workers are always employed inside a building, then this may not be a major problem, but if they need to be outside, perhaps working among traffic or on a busy construction site, then visibility could be more of a problem. As an employer then, you will want to do what you can to improve the lighting situation, but if you can't improve light levels sufficiently or if you are concerned that your staff are not sufficiently noticeable, then investing in high visibility (or hi vis) work shirts is often the most effective solution.
Which hi vis work shirts?
While improving the visibility of your employees is important, you must remember that they still need to be able to carry out their work. You can't afford to fit them with high visibility shirts that restrict their movement or make it difficult or unpleasant for them to carry out whatever tasks may be needed. Before selecting hi vis work shirts for your staff, think about the type of work they need to do and how the high vis workwear must function. If your staff will be working outside in all weathers, then you must not only think about whether the hi vis shirt allows them to be seen but whether it offers them sufficient protection from the weather or grimy conditions. You may also want to think about whether the high visibility shirts must be worn for their entire shift or whether it would be best to have a hi vis jacket that could be placed over other clothing when needed.
Retro-reflective or fluorescent?
One aspect of hi vis work shirts that many people get wrong is the type of visibility mechanism that is needed. It is common for people to buy bright fluorescent hi vis work shirts without considering that this clothing will not work at night. Consider when your team will be working and select fluorescent material for daylight working and retro-reflective hi vis work shirts that will bounce back the light from oncoming traffic or any other source. This material is ideal for those times when your workers will be exposed to danger from nighttime working.
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