Accidents caused by inadequate training in the workplace

How a lack of training at work can lead to personal injury

"Training means helping people to learn how to do something, telling people what they should or should not do, or simply giving them information".

As we have already discussed, training is extremely important in the workplace not just for personal development but also for health and safety reasons.

This case study reveals what can happen if training is not up to scratch or if those working around you are inadequately trained / skilled.

The claimant in this case was employed as a trainee machinist in a factory making wooden products. During his first week he had been promised training and because he had started the job with a group of co-workers also new to the role, the plan was to train everybody in one afternoon.

Unfortunately because the factory was busy that week and there were many people absent through illness, the training never took place.

The claimant injured himself using a lathe type machine that he had received only 5 minutes training on. The machine had poorly constructed guards and was around 20 years old. Despite being maintained any operator using it had to be aware of certain problems. One of which was that the chuck gripping the product being machined, had a weakness and it needed to be tightened regularly during use.

The product became loose whilst the machine revolved and this struck the claimant on the hand fracturing his wrist badly. He claimed work accident compensation and based his case on the issues that he had not been trained to use the machinery nor was the machinery fit for purpose.

The claimant who recovered well from his injury won £6780 in damages and his case was settled amicably with a 13 month period.

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