Risk assessment during pregnancy

[apotomak]

I let my employer know about my pregnancy over 4 months ago. My manager did a risk assessment with me as soon as I told her about my pregnancy. She also said she'll do a new assessment every other week. Since then she was sacked and I got a new manager (whom I haven't seen yet). He got rid of all the paperwork including the risk assessment that my previous manager did with me. As my pregnancy has progressed there are new 'risks' that have started affecting me right now. I work 8.5 hours in a sitting position and I do need an extra support to elevate my legs during my work. The new manager said (to my supervisor) that I don't need any risk assessment now and anyway he can't find any forms for me to fill out. Is he in breach of law? I want to approach him about this subject because I've really started to suffer physically but I do need to know for sure if he's obliged by law to do the risk assesments every now and then or just once. I'd appreciate any thoughts on the subject.

I only had 1 risk assessment done at start of announcing pg.Think is norm though unsure.

Risk assessments should be reviewed regularly during your pregnancy. Every other week seems a bit excessive unless you work in a particularly high risk job, but yes it should be reviewed.

In practice, if the job is a low risk office job, for example, often one risk assessment is done and not reviewed again unless a particular new risk arises.

But if there are new risks that arise as your pregnancy progresses, you should raise them and ask for the support you need. Have you asked for extra support to raise your legs? If you have identified a risk yourself you don't need someone to conduct a formal risk assessment necessarily. You can just say to your manager or supervisor that this new problem has arisen and you would like some additional support for your legs.

Have a look at the HSE guidelines here its quite useful - I think I had 2 risk assessments during my pregnancy but that was when I was employed by the NHS.

They should be carried out as a matter of course for you once you tell your employer you are pregnant and reviewed throughout your pregnancy.

Interestingly, I read that a general RA should be done for women of child-bearing age. Would be interesting to see how often these are carried out.....