The most common cause of damage to pallet racking is down to daily work activities including the impact from mechanical handling equipment and forklifts, uneven loading and wear and tear on components.
Given this, it makes common sense to ensure your industrial storage racks are given regular inspections to ensure compliance with all safety regulations and maintain a safer work environment. Putting an inspection process in place helps prevent poor working practices that can affect your working operations and reputation.
Pallet Racking Threat
Pallets can only fall one way and that is downwards, but the bumps, crashes and collisions that happen in a busy work environment come from all sides and heavily contribute to the weakening of your structural integrity.
For pallet racking, lack of care results in serious consequences such as full system collapse, injury and even death. On top of all of that, your inventory is destroyed and your operations ground to a halt as repairs are conducted – as well as an investigation.
The smallest piece of damage can lead to a hugely expensive loss. A damaged upright can be repaired or replaced at minimal cost compared to an entire system that caves in. the impact from a forklift can seriously compromise the integrity of a supporting upright even with what seems to be superficial damage.
Pallet racking is designed to house a serious amount of weight and store huge volumes of that weight way up high towards the ceiling of the building. These systems rely on the structural strength of all supporting components, from rack frames to locking pins. This is why many insurance companies require a racking inspection to validate insurance for your company.
Regulations
Racking falls under the definition of work equipment and is subject to the UK’s Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, requiring employers to routinely inspect all work equipment under that umbrella that has the potential to deteriorate or suffer any damage. Pallet racking systems fall heavily under this specific criteria.
Therefore, all pallet racking inspections should see that any damage or defects are reported immediately, visual inspection of the entire system is conducted regularly and expert inspections are conducted by competent personnel.
In-House Personnel
An internal member of staff should be appointed to inspect the pallet racking and carry out spot checks between scheduled professional inspections, and a process to document these needs to be put in place and all records of them accurately retained on the premises.
Contact the team at Monarch Shelving for all your pallet racking, commercial shelving and warehouse storage equipment needs.
