Glazing Surveys
We can help you comply with legislation, and identify areas of risk in your building's glass panels and glazing.
Why you need to carry out glazing surveys
Many people are injured each year though, being in-contact with broken Glazing. Glazing is a fragile surface and it is critical that it has been specified and installed correctly to its local environment.
If you are a person responsible for building safety you will need to:
Regulation 14 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 lays down a duty to ensure that building users are not put at risk by the breakage of glazing materials, so that such materials either if they break, break safely, or are not by their nature capable of being broken.
To ensure your installed glazing is effective a survey should be carried out; quantifying the non-compliant glazing. Guidance documents such as BS:6262 Part 4 Code of practice for safety related to human impact (2005) can be used as guidance. Any Glazing found to be non-compliant should be either replaced or made safe.
Glazing surveys and window restrictor assessments
Our glazing compliance audits assess the risk of all the glazing, or glass panels, in a building to ensure compliance with legislation, identifying areas of risk, and proposing remedial works to rectify serious issues or to put methods in place to mitigate the risk of accident.
Our Safety Glazing Surveys are undertaken based on Regulation 14 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992.
We can carry out a glazing survey for all your buildings to ensure all your windows are safe and compliant.
We can assess whether your glazing is safe for people with a visual impairment. Where there is a chance of walking through or into the glass, measures should be taken to prevent possible accidents. For example, a patio door, needs to be defined in such a way that users can separate it from the surrounding area.
Whilst this is not strictly a requirement outside of healthcare facilities, it is good practice to restrict opening windows to below 100mm to prevent accidents. For this reason, we will assess your window openings in our all our standard surveys.
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About glazing surveys
Glazing regulations are covered in the following legislation:
- The Building Regulations 2010, Approved document K, K4 & K5 covers protection from falling, collission and impact.
- The Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992
covers a wide range of basic health, safety and welfare issues and applies to most workplaces (except those involving construction work on construction sites, those in or on a ship, or those below ground at a mine). Regulation 14 covers Windows and transparent or translucent doors, gates and walls.
Regulation 14 Windows and transparent or translucent doors, gates and walls states:
1. Every window or other transparent or translucent surface in a wall or partition and every transparent or translucent surface in a door or gate shall, where necessary for reasons of health or safety
(a) Be of safety material or be protected against breakage of the transparent or translucent material; and
(b) Be appropriately marked or incorporate features so as, in either case, to make it apparent.
A critical location is defined as any glazing in a premises where the glass is exposed below 800mm and in a door to a height of 1400mm or the door side panel (glazing within 300mm of the door) also to a height of 1400mm.
Safety glass is required to be to Toughened, Tempered or Laminated glass. To qualify as Safety glass there must be a kitemark that is visible and legible. When these kitemarks are not present you do not necessarily have to replace the glazing as in most cases you can remedy this by the installation of a suitable safety film with the appropriate labelling.
Our glazing experts can help you make sense of the legislation requirements and help you come up with a plan of action.
What to do next
Our surveys are designed to help you comply with current regulations and guidance, making your site safer for its users.
If you are ready to get started we recommend you talk over your needs with one of our experts. Complete the form below to get in touch.
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