The importance of winter heating health checks
Ensure your heating is working in your workplace by completing health checks this winter.
At some point, we’ve probably all experienced the pains of a broken down heater at home. For some reason, central heating problems always seem to occur at the worst possible time.
Usually, you can get through it by wearing two jumpers and drinking tea around-the-clock. Unfortunately, this approach isn’t suitable if your heating system breaks down at work.
Winter heating health checks are essential to try and ensure your business isn’t disrupted during the cold season. If your boiler does break down during winter, your employees may not be able to safely continue with their work. According to the Health and Safety Executive, the temperature in the workplace should normally not drop below 16 degrees celsius.
There is a legal obligation on employers to provide a working environment with a ‘reasonable’ temperature. This is covered in the Workplace Regulations 1992 and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999. These directives ensure that sufficient risk assessments are performed in regards to temperatures in the workplace.
If the required temperature is not met, it might not be safe for your employees to continue working until the situation is resolved. Getting a boiler fixed in winter is not always straightforward. Plumbers and heating engineers are at their busiest during this time of year, so you may have to wait before they are available. This means unnecessary downtime and your business potentially being bought to a standstill.
To avoid this, you should ensure you have a full check carried out of your heating system as well as annual maintenance to reduce the risk of an unexpected breakdown.
Annual winter heating maintenance
Annual boiler maintenance ensures that your boiler will undergo a thorough inspection to make sure that it’s in good working condition. While some people choose to have a boiler health check during winter, it’s better to have it done well before the cold season.
This is because boilers get used the most during winter, so it makes sense to have it serviced in advance of the drop in temperature. It’s not only the increased usage that can contribute to a breakdown, but also the change of season. Cold weather can cause pipes to freeze or burst, which could cause damage to your heating systems.
This is why getting your boiler serviced before winter is so important. You can identify any components that might have existing defects and replace them so they won’t be as susceptible to further damage when the cold weather sets in.
Increase the efficiency of your heating systems
As winter is the time when your boiler will be used the most, you want to make sure that it’s running as efficiently as possible. Heating costs are likely to go up regardless, but you should still make every effort to limit them.
Faulty parts of your heating systems could result in unnecessary leakage, which means wasted heat energy. A winter heating health check will identify any components of your boiler which aren’t working at maximum efficiency and replace them in order to save you costs in the long run.
It’s not just your boiler that could be wasting energy. Having good insulation is essential when it comes to keeping a lid on your gas bill. As well as providing maintenance for your boiler, Tempus can assess the insulation in your building to make sure that you’re losing as little heat as possible.
All of this allows you to take a more sustainable approach to your company as well. This is a focus for us as an organisation and we know it is becoming a bigger priority for many of our clients too.
How we can help
As part of our mechanical services, Tempus Facilities Management can help by providing your building with a winter heating health check. We will perform a rigorous and thorough examination of your heating systems to make sure that every measure is taken to keep your building warm over winter. We can also provide you with winter heating tips to help minimise your costs over the colder months.
Over the last ten years, we have provided our services to properties of all sizes across the UK. Our nationwide facilities management services have seen us build up a reputation for our knowledge, expertise and excellent customer service.
As well as providing preventative maintenance, we’re also on hand with reactive maintenance 24/7/365. We have operatives based across the country, ready to provide urgent maintenance at a moment’s notice. So if your boiler breaks down on a snowy day in mid-February, then you can contact us and we’ll be there to help you resolve the problem and ensure health and safety compliance.