Expert advice: Nail salon risk assessments

Use the post-Christmas lull to ensure your business is up-to-date with health & safety practises and procedures. Here, Beverly Coleman, nail tech and NEBOSH qualified health & safety advisor, offers her tip for ensure your risk assessments are tip top…

“Helping to preventing accidents and ill-health in the salon setting needn’t be a difficult task,” states Beverly Coleman. “Firstly, it is important to know the risks technicians are exposed to. This can be done by carrying out a risk assessment.

“A risk assessment will help to understand what controls are in place already and what else needs to be done. All salon products should come with a material safety data sheet (MSDS); they provide all the information you need to know about the hazardous nature of products, and what the first aid requirements are. Based on the risk assessment and the MSDS you can eliminate certain substances and work processes and substitute them with safer alternatives.

“For my own business, I have had to ensure that nail technicians are trained in health and safety awareness, as being informed is a legal requirement. Training in COSHH has helped them to understand the hazards involved in the use of substances and training in first aid helps to know what to do it something goes wrong.”