WorkSafe: Violence at Work – Customer Service Areas

Violence can take many different forms; ranging from physical assault and verbal abuse to intimidation and low-level threatening behavior. Violence or threats of violence are never acceptable.

On [their website](http://www.worksafe.govt.nz/worksafe/information-guidance/all-guidance-items/violence-at-work-customer-service-areas), WorkSafe have released a handy fact sheet, explaining how a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) that is office-based can prevent or deal with violence at work.

You must ensure the Health and Safety of workers as much as reasonably practicable, while also ensuring that others aren’t put at risk from your work.

Violence or threats of violence at the workplace can come from many different places, like clients, co-workers or even a worker’s family members or acquaintances.

WorkSafe’s ‘Plan, Do, Check, Act’ approach to work can help you figure out whether violence is a risk to your workers or others, and if so, how you could prevent or deal with it.

Below are a few key points regarding the ‘Plan, Do, Check, Act’ method. You can read the rest on the WorkSafe website.

The ‘Plan’ section is about assessing risk and identifying control methods.

In assessing the risk, you must first understand that risk has two components: the likelihood it will occur and the potential consequences (the degree of harm) if it happens.

To manage risk, you can reduce the chances of it occurring or reduce how serious the potential harm is, if it did occur, or ideally both.

When you move to identifying control methods, you must eliminate risks that arise from your work, so far as is reasonably practicable.

Some control methods will be common for all offices, while others may only be appropriate for certain workplaces or work.

Give preference to the control measures that protect multiple people at once.

The ‘Do’ section is about the implementation of control measures.

As soon as possible after you have made a decision, implement the control measures and ensure your workers know all about them.

The ‘Check’ section is about monitoring the performance of control measures.

Here you’ll implement the means for incidents and near-misses to be reported. You should encourage workers to report incidents or near-misses.

The ‘Act’ section is about acting on the lessons learnt.

By routinely reviewing the effectiveness of your control measures at scheduled periods, you improve them.

Talk to workers about how the control methods are working and ensure you regularly review the reports of incidents or near-misses to check if your control measures are having any effect.

Click [HERE](http://www.worksafe.govt.nz/worksafe/information-guidance/all-guidance-items/violence-at-work-customer-service-areas) to read the full article on WorkSafe’s website, with more examples and detail on each step.