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4 top tips to investigate MHE incidents effectively

Blogs | 26th Nov 2024

There are still too many material handling equipment (MHE) incidents occurring in warehousing and logistics. Proper incident investigation is an important step towards heightening safety. It helps to reduce the risk of further incidents happening in the future.

But if a forklift incident was to occur, it is important to know how to investigate it effectively. Here are four tips that could help you.

  1. Create an investigation team

When a significant incident occurs, it may be investigated by a third party. Such as the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). But any incidents and near misses should always be looked into by the employer.

Internal investigations are usually conducted by a designated team. The incident investigation team should be made up of varied personnel. For example, lift truck operators and warehouse operatives on the front line. As they are most familiar with the tasks, procedures, and risks involved day to day. To supervisors, Instructors, and those in management and health and safety roles.

A cross-disciplinary lift truck incident investigation team helps provide a rounded approach with a range of perspectives. But the team must be committed to making your operation safer and more efficient.

  1. Follow process, identify purpose

It helps to set and follow an MHE incident investigation process. This involves:

  • Discovering information
  • Interviewing witnesses
  • Examining the accident site
  • Collecting physical evidence

This should help to identify the root cause of the incident.

Someone with little knowledge of the day-to-day operation, or without a clear investigation process, might just blame the operator. But the right questions need to be asked. For instance:

  • Was the operator correctly trained?
  • Was racking marked clearly?
  • Were there added time pressures due to poor scheduling?
  • Was the operator supervised?
  • Was the operator fatigued or stressed?
  • Was the equipment working as it should?

A structured analysis can help to find the real reasons for incidents, which may not be immediately obvious. With an effective process, you can learn how human behaviour and conditions contribute to MHE/forklift incidents. Such as fatigue, distractions, and complacency. Your team can then learn strategies to mitigate these risks.

  1. Learn from the experience

Remember the purpose of an incident investigation – preventing future similar incidents. They provide the opportunity to develop and enforce ways of working more safely and efficiently.

Investigating incidents can help to improve a number of areas in your business. It can heighten safety. It can also help to improve your company’s reputation – in the eyes of your employees and the industry. And help to ensure legal compliance.

According to HSE, workplace injuries and ill health cost British employers an estimated £16.2 billion annually. Reducing costs is another benefit of correct incident investigation. Including costs associated with downtime, equipment and product damage, and legal costs.

  1. Implement training

Knowing how and why to investigate an incident is vital for improving day-to-day safety. That’s why we have developed a new eLearning course titled “Materials Handling Equipment (MHE) Incident Investigation”.

It can be used to gain a better understanding of the investigation process. And does so in a time and cost effective way.  The self-paced eLearning can be completed online any time, in around three hours. Helping fit training requirements around operational demands. Candidates can even revisit parts of the course, if they need to clarify anything.

From operators to managers, it teaches how different roles within a company should work together for effective investigations. The RTITB MHE Incident Investigation eLearning is a modern, time-efficient training option for those in management and health and safety roles.

Modules include:

  • Introduction to MHE investigation
  • Human factors in MHE incidents
  • Root cause analysis
  • Steps to effective MHE investigation
  • Identifying risk reduction/control measures
  • Applying learning

The course ends with a 25 multiple-choice question Associated Knowledge theory test. Those who answer 80% of the questions correctly will pass. Successful candidates will be equipped with the knowledge to conduct thorough investigations. This could help reduce future risks and support workplace safety.

Alongside the correct training, supervision and management, this could ultimately save lives in materials handling operations.

Register your interest for the new RTITB Incident Investigation eLearning course. If you have any queries you can also call the team on +44 (0)1952 520200.

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