Kitchen fitter awarded £5,000 for worktop injury

According to the Health & Safety Executive, more than a third of all reported injuries lasting over three days are caused by manual handling - the transporting or supporting of loads by hand or by bodily force.

The Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992 require employers to:

• Avoid the need for hazardous manual handling, so far as is reasonably practicable;
• Assess the risk of injury from any hazardous manual handling that can’t be avoided;
• Reduce the risk of injury from hazardous manual handling, so far as is reasonably practicable.

Our client, a kitchen fitter for a leading DIY chain, had previously expressed a concern to his employer about the difficulties and risks of working alone when delivering and fitting kitchens, but had not received any support or help.

Then on one occasion, whilst delivering kitchen units to a customer, he was required to lift a very large wooden worktop on his own. The worktop weighed over 25 kilogram’s and was difficult and awkward to manoeuvre.

The kitchen fitter dropped the worktop and in doing so, the wooden end scraped his leg badly.

This scrape later became infected and subsequently developed into cellulitis, a very painful skin and blood condition of the deeper layers of the skin and the underlying tissue. Our client ended up staying in hospital for two weeks to receive intravenous antibiotics.

Fortunately he has been able to return to work, but continues to struggle with manual handling tasks.

Initially his employer was reluctant to admit liability for the injury. However, when Bartletts were able to demonstrate that our client had already highlighted the risks of working alone and that no action had been taken, the DIY chain agreed to pay compensation of around £5,000.