Whoopsie - Made a COSHH Trainer walk out.
Posted: Mon Nov 26, 2018 6:25 pm
I was about to say please tell me I have not made a fool of myself, but that ship has sailed in the way that I just handled a situation. It's possible I could even get fired over this/ So please tell me I was at least correct in what I was saying.
We just arranged for someone to comedown from a company that provides our cleaning chemicals to do COSHH Training.
The first thing I noticed was that the training material was old and had the old orange and black coshh symbols on them. its been 9 years, and whilst I have no issue with people knowing them, the new symbols should be being taught. None of the training material had any of the new sheets.
She began the training by saying it is a legal requirement to carry out COSHH training every year. (And effectively get a certificate to say they have done it) My understanding is we legally have to train people on the safe use of chemicals, review our assessments on a regular basis or in response to an incident and retrain if necessary and that we should do regular to do refreseher training, but I cant find anything that specifically says it is the law to train people on COSHH every year. It may just have been the way she worded it, but she made it sound very much like it was a specific regulation.
If anyone can point me in that direction or clear things up.
Then she asked what a COSHH sheet was and someon reponded saying its a sheet that tells you how to use the chemicals. Now, depending on how you inerpret that, yes it does, but generaly only so far as in how to handle the chemicals, not how to apply them to a task, though some people may include those instructions. She flat out said he was wrong and then proceeded to hold up a Material Safet Data Sheet and say this is your COSHH Sheet.
To me, that is wrong. Thats is a Material Data Safety Sheet and that is different to your COSHH Assessment sheet. MSDS is designed, primarily, for industrial manufacture storage and distribution of a product, and the COSHH Assessment is where you take the relevant information for your business from the MSDS. Much of the information is a straight transfer, but some is not and requires the assessor to have an understanding of how the chemical is used in your environment. Not only that, but when it comes to training staff, and MSDS has way to much information that they wont comprehend and will confuse them.
This then lead to the argument as I tried to point this out. Unfortunately her responsse was an absolutely flat no the 'COSHH SHEET' (the msds) is everything and you follow it to the letter. End of. I tried to point that things are different for dealing with a product its it neat form in vast quantities than it is for using a diluted version in a spray bottle and she went ballistic and walked out.
Now, I should have approached her afterwards or pulled her aside instead of doing this in front of the staff (though I didnt have a chance once a simple question went from simple to ballistic in no seconds flat) and the staff all believe she as the trainer is right and therefore i'm wrong. Thats my bad an I expect that.
But is this how you guys see COSHH or AM i wrong?
We just arranged for someone to comedown from a company that provides our cleaning chemicals to do COSHH Training.
The first thing I noticed was that the training material was old and had the old orange and black coshh symbols on them. its been 9 years, and whilst I have no issue with people knowing them, the new symbols should be being taught. None of the training material had any of the new sheets.
She began the training by saying it is a legal requirement to carry out COSHH training every year. (And effectively get a certificate to say they have done it) My understanding is we legally have to train people on the safe use of chemicals, review our assessments on a regular basis or in response to an incident and retrain if necessary and that we should do regular to do refreseher training, but I cant find anything that specifically says it is the law to train people on COSHH every year. It may just have been the way she worded it, but she made it sound very much like it was a specific regulation.
If anyone can point me in that direction or clear things up.
Then she asked what a COSHH sheet was and someon reponded saying its a sheet that tells you how to use the chemicals. Now, depending on how you inerpret that, yes it does, but generaly only so far as in how to handle the chemicals, not how to apply them to a task, though some people may include those instructions. She flat out said he was wrong and then proceeded to hold up a Material Safet Data Sheet and say this is your COSHH Sheet.
To me, that is wrong. Thats is a Material Data Safety Sheet and that is different to your COSHH Assessment sheet. MSDS is designed, primarily, for industrial manufacture storage and distribution of a product, and the COSHH Assessment is where you take the relevant information for your business from the MSDS. Much of the information is a straight transfer, but some is not and requires the assessor to have an understanding of how the chemical is used in your environment. Not only that, but when it comes to training staff, and MSDS has way to much information that they wont comprehend and will confuse them.
This then lead to the argument as I tried to point this out. Unfortunately her responsse was an absolutely flat no the 'COSHH SHEET' (the msds) is everything and you follow it to the letter. End of. I tried to point that things are different for dealing with a product its it neat form in vast quantities than it is for using a diluted version in a spray bottle and she went ballistic and walked out.
Now, I should have approached her afterwards or pulled her aside instead of doing this in front of the staff (though I didnt have a chance once a simple question went from simple to ballistic in no seconds flat) and the staff all believe she as the trainer is right and therefore i'm wrong. Thats my bad an I expect that.
But is this how you guys see COSHH or AM i wrong?