Hazards and control measures
Slip, trip and fall hazards and control measures
The slip and trip hazards found on sites and in workplaces, who gets hurt and how, and the controls HSE expects: clear walkways, leads kept off the floor, spills cleaned at once, good lighting, gritting and suitable footwear. With a worked example from a completed RAMS.
What are the main slip and trip hazards at work?
Most trips are caused by obstructions in walkways, such as trailing leads, waste and materials, and the rest by uneven surfaces. Slips come from a wet or contaminated floor, made worse by poor cleaning, unsuitable flooring or footwear, bad lighting and the weather. Slips, trips or falls on the same level were 30% of the employee injuries reported to HSE in 2024/25, more than any other kind of accident.
Last updated . Facts checked by the SiteSurvey team on 24 October 2026 against HSE: Slips and trips, causes and prevention, HSE: Slips and trips, frequently asked questions, HSE: Non-fatal injuries at work in Great Britain and Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992, regulation 12.
Where slip and trip hazards show up
A slip or trip on the level is a fall where nobody was working at height: a person goes over on a wet floor, catches a foot on a lead or a pallet strap, or steps off an uneven edge. It happens in every trade. Builders and groundworkers trip on spoil, offcuts and hoses. Electricians and AV installers run leads across corridors. Cleaners and facilities staff work on floors that are wet by design, and anyone clearing a flat or a store room is walking over the very waste they are there to remove.
HSE describes slips with a slip potential model: contamination on the floor, the cleaning regime, the people, the flooring, the environment and the footwear all play a part, and one or more of them may be behind any slip. Trips are simpler. HSE says most are caused by obstructions in walkways and the rest by uneven surfaces. Lighting matters for both, since too little light hides the hazard and too much on a shiny floor causes glare. Rain carried in on boots, condensation and frost turn a smooth floor slippery, and metal flooring is often much more slippery than people expect.
Who is harmed, and how
Slips, trips and falls on the same level are the most common kind of workplace injury reported to HSE. Of the 59,219 non-fatal injuries to employees reported by employers under RIDDOR in 2024/25, 30% were slips, trips or falls on the same level, well ahead of handling, lifting or carrying at 17%. Each one is easy to dismiss as minor, yet together they cause more reported injuries than any other kind of accident.
The people hurt are usually doing something ordinary: carrying a load that hides their feet, walking a route someone else has just mopped, or crossing a corridor where a lead was run for a short job and left there. Visitors and members of the public are at risk wherever a job spills into a shared space, which is why the route past the work is part of the job, not an afterthought. A fall on the level near an open edge or stair can also become a fall from height, covered on the work at height page.
What the law expects
Regulation 12 of the Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992 says floors and traffic routes must be suitable for their use, free of holes, slopes, unevenness or slipperiness that put people at risk, and kept free of obstructions and of anything that could cause a slip, trip or fall, so far as reasonably practicable. Stairs need suitable handrails. In practice the controls follow the hierarchy. First remove the hazard: cordless tools so there is no lead, materials delivered to where they are used, a floor with the right slip resistance. Then guard it: leads and hoses run at high level or covered where they cross a route, a separate route around a wet area, temporary lighting where daylight is poor.
Then housekeeping, which HSE puts alongside walkways and design as the three areas to tackle: waste cleared as the work goes, spills cleaned at once, and outdoor routes gritted before frost when ice is forecast. Footwear with a good grip comes last, because it helps only once the floor is as safe as it can be made. In SiteSurvey, the RAMS template records the controls for each hazard and warns when only PPE is ticked, and the Suggested controls list follows the same order.
Suggested controls
Slips, trips and falls: control measures, most effective first
These are the 6 controls the SiteSurvey RAMS and risk assessment forms offer for this hazard as a tick list, grouped by their level in the hierarchy of controls. They are a starting point from HSE guidance, not an assessment of your job: tick what applies and say how it works on your site. If only personal protective equipment is ticked, the form says so. How suggested controls work and the hierarchy of controls explained.
Swap the hazard for something less harmful: a quieter tool, a cold-applied method, a smaller pack.
- Cordless tools so there are no trailing leads
Keep people away from the hazard with a physical measure: a guardrail, a barrier, extraction, isolation.
- Leads and hoses run at high level or covered where they cross routes
- Temporary lighting where daylight is poor
Change the way the work is done: a permit, a check, training, supervision, timing.
- Waste cleared as the work goes and routes kept clear
- Spills cleaned at once and wet or icy surfaces gritted or covered
Protect the person as the last line: a harness, hard hat, gloves or respirator. Never the only control.
- Safety boots with a good grip worn
Offered to: every type of work in the RAMS form.
Try it
Build the controls for slips, trips and falls
Tick the controls you would put in place, see which levels of the hierarchy they reach, and score the risk before and after. Or fill in the example from a completed RAMS to see how one crew did it.
Interactive
Try it: slips, trips and falls on the level
Works the same way as the RAMS form. Nothing you tick is saved or sent anywhere.
Your controls, by level
- Eliminateno control at this level for this hazard
- Substitutenot ticked
- Engineeringnot ticked
- Adminnot ticked
- PPEnot ticked
Nothing ticked yet.
3. Score the risk with these controls
What the law says
- Workplace (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations 1992, regulation 12
- Floors and traffic routes suitable for their use, free of holes, unevenness and slipperiness that put people at risk, kept clear of obstructions and anything that could cause a slip, trip or fall, with handrails on stairs.
- Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, regulation 3
- The suitable and sufficient risk assessment that identifies the slip and trip hazards and the controls.
- Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2015
- On construction work, a site kept in good order with safe access and egress, planned and managed through the construction phase plan.
Worked example
Slips, trips and falls in a completed RAMS
The hazard entry exactly as it was recorded in one of our completed example RAMS: the controls ticked from the list, how they apply on that job, and the score before and after the further action.
Facilities, cleaning and maintenance
Ravensworth Court flat 14: void clearance and deep clean
- Hazard
- Slips, trips and falls on the level: Whole flat, worst in the bathroom and the hall
- What could happen, and to whom
- Standing water and fluids on the bathroom floor, a loose and rucked hall carpet with exposed gripper rod, rubbish bags across the floors, and poor light because the electricity is off at the meter until the housing association's electrician reconnects it on the afternoon of 11 November. The crew.
- Controls ticked
- Cordless tools so there are no trailing leads
- Waste cleared as the work goes and routes kept clear
- Spills cleaned at once and wet or icy surfaces gritted or covered
- Temporary lighting where daylight is poor
- Safety boots with a good grip worn
- How they apply on this job
- Two battery LED site lights and head torches used on 11 November, placed before anyone works in a room. The bathroom floor is mopped and dried before the sharps sweep starts and spills are dealt with as they happen. The hall carpet is lifted and bagged early in step 3 so the trip is gone before the furniture goes out. Bags are taken down as they are filled, not stacked in the hall. Cordless tools only until the power is back, and the 230 V machines on 12 November are run on an RCD plug with the lead kept against the skirting. Safety boots worn by both operatives.
- Risk with these controls (likelihood x severity)
- 3 x 3 = 9 (Medium)
- Further action
- Lighting placed and the bathroom floor dried before the sweep starts; checked by G. Mellor at the step 2 hold point. Owner: P. Nowak.
- Residual risk
- 2 x 2 = 4 (Low)
A fictional job, filled in as a worked example. The form and the report are real.
It also appears in foundations and drainage for a house extension, led display and speakers in a school hall, pump replacement in a foul water chamber, independent scaffold on a seafront hotel and pallet racking in a live warehouse. All eleven completed RAMS.
Slips, trips and falls: common questions
Are slips and trips really the most common injury at work?
Yes, among injuries reported to HSE. In 2024/25, 30% of the employee injuries reported by employers under RIDDOR were slips, trips or falls on the same level, ahead of handling, lifting or carrying at 17%. They are easy to dismiss because each one looks minor. That is why they belong in the RAMS with their own controls rather than a line saying good housekeeping.
How should we deal with trailing leads on a job?
Start by not having them: cordless tools remove the lead altogether. Where a lead is needed, run it at high level or along the wall, and cover it where it has to cross a route. HSE names trailing wires as one of the obstructions to keep out of walkways. The worked example on this page keeps the lead against the skirting for that reason.
What should we do about ice and wet entrances?
Grit outdoor routes such as entrances, car parks, walkways and slopes when ice is forecast. HSE says gritting works best in the early evening before frost settles, or early in the morning before people arrive, and that heavy rain can wash grit away. Divert people to a safer route where you cannot treat one, and take the warning cones away once the ice has gone so people keep trusting them.
Do safety boots solve the slip problem?
No. Footwear is one factor in HSE's slip potential model alongside contamination, cleaning, flooring, the environment and people. Boots with a good grip help, but only once the floor is kept clean and dry and the routes are clear. The RAMS template warns when PPE is the only control ticked for a hazard, so boots are never the whole answer.
Last updated . See every hazard in the library.
Write the RAMS with these controls already listed.
Pick the hazard, tick its controls, score it and brief the crew, on a phone or laptop. The report goes to the client as one PDF.