Electrical Safety at the office

Electrical safety in an office is very similar to electrical safety at home, except for there is larger equipment and more people around.

A busy office

• Watch for unapproved equipment
• Don't overload circuits
• and inspect your surroundings

At the Office

What is different from your office to your home? Mostly it's your surroundings, and how they are continuously changing. New employees, clients coming and going. New photocopiers, extension cords across the hall, and other equipment that you typically don't have at home.

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Preventing Accidents

Electrical accidents that occur in an office environment are usually a result of faulty or defective equipment, unsafe installation, or misuse of equipment – specifically, extension cords, power strips, and surge protectors... {SOURCE}

The best way to stay safe at the office is to be aware of your surroundings, and complete casual inspections of your work area on a continual basis.

Things to look out for around your desk include:

Un-protected cords on the floor.

A lot of electrical shocks around the office or construction site are from damaged cords. Stretching an extension cord across the floor expose them to damage, and creates a shock hazard. If you have to use an extension cord, protect it. There are great products for this, search on Amazon.

Be sure that you are checking the cord from damage even when it is hidden, they can hide damage as well as protect them.

Don't store anything in front of electrical panels, or anything that has any electrical equipment in it.

I go to site more often than I like finding the "electrical room" turned into the janitor's closet, or general store room. The electrical panels need to have a minimum of 1m in front of them, and a clear path towards them. This is to allow proper and safe use of the panel when needed.

Plug space heaters into a dedicated receptacle, not the space bar.

Don't overload your power bars! Space heaters are a large corded load, when they are plugged into a power bar, you run the risk of overloading the bar, without tripping the breaker. This will cause a fire hazard as the power bar heats up.

Always use grounded plugs, and NEVER cut off the ground on a 3 prong plug.

This is not something that happens as much in newer offices, but you will see it when someone uses a cheap extension cord that isn't grounded. These are made for lamps and other ungrounded equipment, but are used for general purpose. If you have a 3 prong cord, ALWAYs use the 3 prongs. Never cut it off, or modify the extension cord "to make it work".

Office Electrical Safety Summary

Staying safe with electricity around the office is a lot of common sense – use equipment as its intended, don't use damaged equipment, don't modify cords, inspect your cords and keep your cords protected.

What are some of things you do to safe at work? Share them in the comments.