Probably an old chestnut but is there a 'cut off point' for gritting? We have a contractor that grits our car parks and pavements if the forecast or actual temperature is below zero. Does this sound reasonable?

Some good advice on here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8420755.stm

You can grit to early or too late!

It depends if your aim is to remian legally compliant or legally complaint and protected from insurance claims!

Resonably practicable measures need to be adopted (organisations cannot simply do nothing if it was resonably expected to snow / ice).

We identify key priority areas that should be managed by staff (in our case store staff) by this we mean clearing ice / snow then gritting to prevent ice / snow build up and regulary monitoring and re-clearing where required.

Key areas for us are the pedestrian walkways, loading bay, trolley bay, entrance / exit route and fire escape routes. It would not be resonably practicable for the entire car park to remain snow / ice free during harsh winter weather (simply spreading grite during these times will not work, the ice / snow would need to be cleared first to be affective).

We also require local management to monitor the car park and if an unaccpetable risk is identified (e.g. if the car park was on a slope and vechiles could potentially slide on the snow and ice, with it not being possible to clear the entire vehcile routes) then the car park (or sections of) should be closed.

With the above controls we have been able to fight some (but not all....) PL claims raised last year.