Lift broken at work

[Mitara]

The lift has been broken in my workplace for the last month.

The employer said he has been waiting for a part that he ordered.

However i have heard him moan about the cost of getting the lift fixed. He said that it will cot him thousands of pounds to get it fixed . He wont be paying for it out of his own pocket. It will come out of company money, but he just doesnt like paying for it.

The lift being broken has resulted in me and other members of staff having to walk up and down a lot of stairs more for normal tasks, and we are also having to do heavy lifting up and down stairs. I honestly feel like im going to collapse.

Is there any law or workplace safety regulation that states that an emloyer must get a lift fixed, if not having a lift is causing health and safety risks to employees.

I was trying to look it up last night but havent found anything specific yet. I would love to find something specific and show it to him

Then write this to management, your GP, acas and the hse.

OP, do you keep a full set of tyres, battery, windscreen wipers, etc. etc. for your car; igniters, heat exchangers, etc. etc. for your boiler, just in case you need them ?
We're not talking a couple of extra light bulbs here.

Are you doing that 10 times a day carrying heavy bags of linen?

Tyres for my car: yes i do keep a spare tyre.

The Battery and windscreen wipers have never broken in any of my cars.

If a lift is vital for an organisation and it effects the health and safety of many others, spare parts should be ordered in.

Yes, dramatic language. If you don't want to do it ANYMORE, and it's not part of your job then STOP DOING IT.

That must be really tough and I wouldn’t be happy doing it for an extended period. I would be inclined to insist on temps hired specifically for the heavy lifting (so they know what to expect and hopefully have a higher strength/fitness level).

However YABU to blame your employer for it taking so long to arrive and being convinced that the part hasn’t been ordered. Plenty of PPs have confirmed that lift parts for older models often take a long time to arrive and then be fitted. I don’t know who you think should keep the parts in stock but given that they’re costly and there’s no way to know which parts will need to be replaced, that would not be practical for lift owners really. Complaining about the price so much also suggests to me that the cost has already been incurred.

I have fucking stopped doing it. For fuck sake. Read my thread.

I started this thread out of concern for OTHER staff at my workplace, who still have to do it.

They look like they are about to have a heart attack

Untill it's fixed could you make a chain of people up the first flight of stairs pass it between yous and rinse and repeat. Save yous going up and down

There's no point, it's the lift company engineer who assesses and repairs the lift, not your workplace there are hundreds of parts and many reasons lifts break down.

Not fixing a broken lift is wrong on many levels.

Your company must have a head office - i.e. your boss's bosses. Contact them. You can do it anonymously if you like.

There is more to my suspicion. If i havent written everything out, it is because i am at work right now and i am coming back to this thread now and again.

Where i work there are two buildings. Two of them are run by a different manager. In one building , if the lift breaks, it is fixed straight away.

In the other building, if the lift breaks, it takes ages to fix it.

Long term staff have said to me "oh its like that every year. He takes ages to fix it. Its because johnny (the manager) doesn't like shelling out the money to fix the lift."

I go up and down 2 flights of stairs roughly 20 times in a working day. That's not a lot in a whole day.

Do you carrt heavy weights up and down those 2 flights of stairs, 20 times every working day?

I have read your thread, please don't swear at me.

I acknowledge you are concerned about colleagues but shouting and swearing will not help them and will only make you appear irrational.

Support your colleagues by helping them check their contract t&C's contact union etc. but don't bang on at strangers on the internet if you don't want their input.

Could they throw/kick the bags down, so they only have to carry them up?

This does sound awful, cleaners have a bloody hard physical job even without this and if they get injured from carrying heavy loads up and down stairs could be unable to work for months.

They should refuse to do it any more unless every single person in the building helps, including the boss who is too tight to get the lift repaired.

I carry 'stuff' up and down most times but it depends if you're talking me doing it 20 times over an 8 hour shift or someone doing it 20 times in an hour really

Googling it, does a lift used in workplace need to be fixed uk, it does say it needs to be legally fixed. It comes under the Health and safety act of 1974 and lifts should be regularly tested. Has it been subject to tests that it is in good working order? I worked in a care home as a student doing laundry and definitely needed a lift to take the clothes around to those on the second floor. Lugging up bags of bedding several times a week would be a lot especially if you are not fit or anyone disabled in the company is also entitled under the law to have access to a lift already in the workplace. Ivwould complain again citing the health act and about regular inspection for a lift.

This was 30 years ago, to be fair, so around 1992/1993 - I'd hope that things have changed!

Believe it or not, it was actually booked by an organisation/charity for disabled people. They supported all kinds of disabilities, not just physical, but I'd say the majority of their members were in wheelchairs or had severe physical disabilities. It's inconceivable that they didn't check these things!

I was very young, and have no idea how the place was chosen or booked. At the time, I just cracked on with things and didn't really ask how/why such a bad decision had been made.

I suspect the idea was that it was a small place that only local skiers visited, so there would be space away from hordes of tourists. The trouble with that was that the local ski slopes didn't have ski lifts that could easily accommodate disabled skiers either!! And then the lack of accessibility at the hotel....

But yes, dreadful situation!

I hope you are not carrying heavy bags of linen, that really doesn't sound safe.

So do I, so do most people.

But most people aren’t carrying heavy bags of linen up and down on top of a very physical job.

If you have never been a cleaner for a hotel (or whatever OP is) then you have no idea how physically demanding it is and now they’re expected to carry heavy loads of linen.

In every hotel or hospital etc you go to you will see huge trolleys of linen being taken in the lifts because they are heavy and it’s time consuming having to carry them up and down the stairs.

I don't suppose the OP does keep all those things at home, but then places like Halfords, and plumbing, and heating shops and companies don't usually keep you waiting for more than a few days; unless you have something like a rare vintage car, and I expect that owners of such vehicles do actually keep extra parts in!

I think that @Mitara's idea is actually a brilliant one for the items that are well known to fail in lifts, especially for places like care homes, where I think that the OP probably works.

In the meantime, if the OP's work is a place that homes vulnerable adults or children, then the manager should ask their local courts, or councils, to get people who have been sentenced with community orders, or such like, to stop picking up litter, or painting over graffiti etc. and instead to do the heavy lifting until the lift is fixed. They would obviously have to be well supervised, and not be allowed in any of the vulnerable people's bedrooms, but I think it could be workable.

Also, the manager should have to show the paperwork/emails where the spare part was ordered, and any follow up posts telling the manager of any delays. I think that that should just be a regular rule for anyone wanting assistance from any outside organisation. Also, I think that when any of those organisations that I mentioned are requested to help, the request should be considered from any of the workforce, or the residents themselves, or even the residents family.
One last thought is that if there happened to be an army barracks near by, maybe they would be willing to help short-term?

And it's if it's a new demand. If you go for an interview and get told you'll have to climb the equivalent of 40 flights a day, then you can decide if that's the job for you. If you were told you'd never need to climb stairs, and took the job on under that understanding, that's another issue. Also, people can develop health issues. It's not simply about age, though several people state that (with no other health conditions), they found their joints ached when they hit menopause. And before anyone says it, yes, there are many older women who could skip up 40 flights a day-I am simply saying it's not abnormal for many people to have problems climbing lots of stairs, and just because someone finds it easy today doesn't mean they'll have no issues in the future. For me, the temperature would be relevant-I could happily climb, even carrying things, in a cool air-conned building, but up and down on a hot day in a sweaty stairwell? Nope!

Yes walk them multiple times carrying stuff

Very droll, minister.