Goldsmiths - University of London

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Health and Safety

Display Screen Equipment

This includes computer screen, PC, Mac and laptop, pointer device, printer, telephone, desk, chair, and working environment (lighting, space, temperature and noise).

Safe Office Practice

Use this on-line resource to help you avoid health problems arising from computer use. Start with the step by step guide to setting up your computer, chair and desk, including notebooks and laptops. Then use the interactive assessment to check everything is correct.

Report any problems that you cannot resolve yourself to your line manager or departmental health and safety coordinator.

If you are suffering from a medical condition that may be related to computer use, ask your line manager for a referral to Occupational Health. Line Managers should contact their department business manager in HR, who will arrange for a workstation assessment to be carried out by the Occupational Health Nurse adviser.

Eye tests

Staff who are DSE users are entitled to eyesight tests and basic spectacles for DSE use, at no charge to themselves. A DSE user requesting an eyesight test will be issued with a pre-paid voucher by the Human Resources Department and asked to make an appointment with a convenient SpecSavers branch, where the voucher is exchanged for an eyesight test, and basic spectacles for DSE use if needed. DSE users are entitled to free eyesight tests at intervals recommended by the optician or if suffering from headaches or sight problems that may be related to DSE work.

DSE users are Goldsmiths’ employees who: use display screen equipment regularly and continuously for more than an hour at a time; depend on this equipment to do their work; have to transfer information quickly to or from the screen; apply high levels of attention or concentration; and need to have received special training or skills to use the equipment.