Blacks Haulage Solutions Ltd are based in Bathgate West Lothian Scotland. They've been trading for almost 50 years and the business is wholly owned by Stuart and Michelle Black.
Blacks handle a wide range of loads with curtain-sided trailers, van containers, and skeletal trailers for moving shipping containers, as well as flat beds for the distribution of fish feed. They have approximately 50,000 sqft of warehouse space. They are also members of the Pallex pallet network operating several night truck deliveries into the wider UK, and 6 local delivery vehicles.
The Challenge
At the time Safetynet began working with Blacks they had 16 members of staff working on-site at the premises of a key customer. They wanted to maintain an environment where Health and Safety was paramount - not only for staff wellbeing, but to help them demonstrate their understanding and knowledge of this particular customer's operation. The customer is a manufacturing business and Blacks felt that improving their experience of the manufacturing work environment would benefit their relationship and the service they provided. They also wanted to remove any disadvantage they might have because of their limited knowledge of the industry - with staff working in a facility they were unfamiliar with.
In short, Blacks wanted to improve the customer/supplier relationship and do everything possible to consolidate the engagement. By identifying workplace safety as a challenge to that, they were able to bring the two teams together and improve everyone's understanding of what was required of them to maintain a good working environment for all.
The Solution
At this point, Blacks engaged the services of Safetynet to help them achieve this objective. We were able to move a Safetynet consultant onto the customer site promptly, to enable Blacks staff to work closely with their customer, to identify all area’s where safety could be improved and where their staff could be integrated seamlessly into their client’s health and safety management system.
Blacks now have clear guidelines, policies and procedures that not only help whilst working at this customer's site - but we've helped them develop a blueprint for adopting these into their own facilities in Bathgate and Whitburn.
Moving Forward
The Safetynet online portal, hands on support and the fact that they get a quick response whenever they have a question or issue, means Blacks have their health and safety in competent hands. In a business where every day can involve a lot of changes to schedules and requires quick thinking and flexibility, Safetynet have been able to give Blacks the assurance that whenever they are faced with an H&S issue, they have a team they can rely on.
Most of Blacks' customers expect them to have professional health and Safety advisors and Safetynet provides this. Our engagement with Blacks goes a long way when they are working on existing contracts and drawing up new contracts. They tell us "It demonstrates to our existing and potential customers that we take Health and Safety very seriously. It also demonstrates the value we place on our staff, through implementing safe systems of work and the associated training requirements”.
