How I Use the Slips, Trips and Falls Template with Customers in Pilla
Slips, trips and falls account for around a third of all non-fatal workplace injuries reported to the HSE. I've audited sites where the risk assessment existed, the wet floor signs were in the cupboard, and the cleaning schedule was pinned to the wall. But the kitchen porter was mopping a corridor with no sign out, a delivery had been left blocking the fire exit for two hours, and nobody had checked the car park since the last frost. The paperwork looked fine. The floor didn't.
The gap is rarely the policy itself. It's the distance between what's written down and what's happening at 7am when the first delivery arrives and the floors are still wet from last night's clean. That's what this article covers. I'll walk you through what your slips, trips and falls policy needs to address, give you a ready-made template you can edit for your own operation, and explain the bits that actually matter when an HSE inspector turns up.
Key Takeaways
- What are slips, trips and falls in health and safety? Slips, trips and falls are the most common cause of non-fatal workplace injury in the UK. A slips, trips and falls policy sets out how your business identifies the hazards, controls the risks, and maintains the housekeeping standards that prevent them
- Why do you need a slips, trips and falls policy? The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 require floors to be suitable, in good condition, and free from obstructions. An HSE inspector will check your arrangements, and poor housekeeping is one of the fastest ways to pick up an enforcement notice
- How do you set it up in Pilla? Use the knowledge hub template below, edit it to match your operation, and share it with your team through the app so everyone has access and you can track who's read it
- How do you automate the follow-up? Set up Poppi to chase staff who haven't acknowledged the policy and flag when it's due for review
Article Content
Understanding What's Required of You
Slips, trips and falls are the single biggest cause of workplace major injuries. That's not a niche risk for warehouses or construction sites. It covers offices, restaurants, care homes, retail shops, and every other workplace you can think of. A wet floor, a box left in a walkway, a loose mat edge. That's all it takes.
The legal framework sits across two pieces of legislation. The Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 places a general duty on employers to ensure the health and safety of employees and anyone affected by the work. The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 get more specific: floors must be suitable for purpose, kept in good condition, and free from obstructions that could cause someone to slip, trip or fall. Regulation 12 is the one that matters most here, and it's the one an HSE inspector will go to if they see problems.
Your slips, trips and falls policy needs to cover three areas. First, hazard identification: what could cause someone to slip, trip or fall in your specific workplace. Second, control measures: what you're doing about each of those hazards. Third, monitoring: how you check that the controls are working and that new hazards haven't appeared.
I've lost count of the number of sites where the risk assessment lists "wet floors" as a hazard but doesn't say where the wet floor signs are kept, who's responsible for putting them out, or what happens when a spill occurs during service. That's not a control measure. That's a wish.
What an HSE inspector looks for is straightforward. They want to see that you've identified the specific slip, trip and fall hazards for your premises. They want evidence that you've done something about them. And they want to see that you're checking it's working. Walkways clear, floors maintained, spills dealt with promptly, staff trained, and someone responsible for keeping an eye on all of it. If they walk in and trip over a delivery crate in the corridor, the conversation is going to be short.
Setting It Up as a Knowledge Hub Entry
I've built a slips, trips and falls template in Pilla covering staff awareness, housekeeping standards, risk assessment, floor maintenance, pedestrian movement monitoring, and control measures. It gives you a structured starting point, but you should edit it to reflect how your site actually operates.
In the knowledge hub, create a new entry and tag it with "Health and Safety System". Use the same tag across all of your health and safety policies so they are grouped together and Poppi can track them as a set. Assign the entry to all teams so that everyone in the business can access it.
The template is designed to be edited, not just filed. Read through every section. Where it says something generic, replace it with what actually happens in your workplace. If you don't have outdoor areas, remove the bit about car parks. If your main risk is wet floors in a kitchen, expand that section with your specific cleaning and signage procedures. An HSE inspector wants to see that your policy reflects your operation, not that you've downloaded a template and stuck your name on it.
36. Slips trips and falls
Company Name have a duty to protect the health & safety of our employees and clientele visiting our venue, this includes the risks of slipping, tripping and falling.
Company Name aim to minimise the risk of slips trips and falls by following these safety arrangements.
*Responsible Persons to raise awareness amongst staff about keeping walkways clear and areas clean and tidy.
Provide training to staff on the importance of good housekeeping. Document all training provided.
Identify senior team members who will be responsible for monitoring and improving safe pedestrian movement around the venue.
Identify through assessment of risk all the potential causes of slips, trips and falls.
Developing and implementing procedures and control measures.
Ensure that floor surfaces are fit for the purpose, that they are routinely maintained and checked.
Ensure that any risk assessments or safety inspections are carried out by competent and trained personnel.
Monitor and review of our arrangements to ensure that we have in place sufficient protocols to control the potential risk of slips trips and falls.
*Responsible Persons are identified on the House Responsibility Chart section of the health & safety policy
This is a preview of the template. In Pilla, you can edit this to match your business.
What I'd want to see when reviewing this:
The risk assessment section is the backbone of the whole policy. I'd want to see that you've walked your premises and identified every specific hazard, not just written "wet floors" and "trailing cables" because those are the obvious ones. Think about transitions between floor surfaces, thresholds where people catch their feet, areas where lighting is poor, routes that get congested at shift change, and outdoor areas that freeze in winter. Each hazard should have a named control measure next to it.
The housekeeping standards section needs to be specific enough that a new starter could read it and know exactly what "keep walkways clear" means in your building. Which walkways. What counts as clear. Where things should go instead.
Common mistakes I see:
The awareness and training section often says staff will be trained on good housekeeping, but doesn't say when, how often, or what that training covers. I want to see induction training for new starters, refresher training at a defined frequency, and records of both. If you can't show an HSE inspector that your team has been trained, it's the same as not training them.
The floor maintenance section is the one most businesses skip over. The template covers ensuring surfaces are fit for purpose and routinely maintained. I see operations where floor tiles have been cracked for months, mats have curled edges, and the transition strip between the kitchen and dining room came loose weeks ago. If you put "routinely maintained and checked" in your policy, you need a schedule that proves it.
The monitoring and review section is the last one people fill in and the first one that falls apart. The template says you'll monitor and review arrangements to ensure sufficient protocols are in place. That means someone is named, a frequency is set, and findings are recorded and acted on. Not a vague commitment to "keep an eye on things."
Automate the Follow-Up with Poppi
Writing the policy is one thing. Making sure your team has actually read it is another. Poppi can handle the chasing so you don't have to.
If you mark the knowledge hub entry as mandatory, Poppi will track who's read it and who hasn't. You can set up automations to chase staff who are behind, notify managers when someone completes the policy, and get a regular report showing where the gaps are.
Here are three automations I'd set up for any knowledge hub policy:
Tom, you have 2 overdue policies to read and acknowledge
Overdue training reminders
Automatically chase team members who have mandatory policies they haven't read yet. Poppi sends the reminder so you don't have to.
Tom, you have 2 overdue policies to read and acknowledge
Emma has completed a mandatory policy
Video completion alerts
Get notified when a team member finishes reading or watching a policy, so you can track progress without chasing.
Emma has completed a mandatory policy
Training Report: 87% team completion. Tom and Sarah behind on 2 mandatory policies, due 3 days ago.
Training gap analysis
Get a regular AI report showing which team members are behind on mandatory policies and where the gaps are across your team.
Training Report: 87% team completion. Tom and Sarah behind on 2 mandatory policies, due 3 days ago.