Arco has launched a new Safety Signs catalogue with over 3,000 signs that meet current BS and potential future EN standards, and advice to help businesses prepare for any changes.
The catalogue helps businesses choose safety signs to warn of remaining risk or to instruct employees of the measures they must take to stay safe in the workplace. All of the Arco signs available through this catalogue meet the ISO 7010 standard and new symbols will be phased in when they become available to meet the ISO EN 7010 standard.
The Health & Safety (Safety, Signs & Signals) Regulations 1996 state that it is a legal requirement for all businesses and commercial organisations with public access to buildings to highlight health and safety risks through the use of suitable signs.
Supporting these regulations is an active British Standard ‘BS 5499-1:2002 Graphical symbols and signs – safety signs which are designed to provide clear guidelines to the use and appearance of safety signs in the UK’.
The ISO 7010 Graphical symbols was introduced in 2003 to develop consistency between safety signs used throughout Europe. However, it sat alongside the British Standard as a recommended best practice rather than a requirement. It has now been proposed that ISO 7010 will become ISO EN 7010, meaning that it will become a European Normative, where the standard must be written into UK and EU law after an introductive period.
When ISO 7010 becomes an EN standard it is important that workplaces are prepared. It will not be a legal requirement to change existing signs and there will be an introduction period of notice prior to it becoming law, but all new safety signs will have to conform to the new standard. To aid companies choosing the correct sign out of the thousands available, the Arco catalogue contains the essential safety signs in the workplace, all of which conform to the new legislation.
