Is it labelled toxic, corrosive, oxidising, harmful, irritant or flammable. See symbols on reverse of this sheet Read instructions on the product and apply recommendations prior to use .If PPE is required and you do not have the PPE required do not use the substance. If no label do not use. SBH

I do not disagree with the comments made so far. But... My experience in this field is that - if your staff member was to be injured in relation to a chemical used whilst working and the HSE/LA have an involvement they will want to see you COSHH risk assessment. I have argued the point to LA that these are everyday products that staff would/could use in their own homes and with some training a lay person should be able to use these products safely. Their argument is that they are at work so COSHH applies. And for this reason we now have 50 odd COSHH assessments for most household products that are used in the social care setting. Mrs Noodles, Some household products can be hazardous for example some oven cleaners can be corrosive, we try to support our clients to purchase less hazardous products such as irritants instead of corrosives. The problem arise when they ask your staff to mix up the toxic weed killer they brought from B&Q (other shops are available) to put down on their driveway!!

Is the list you give, effectively a list of tasks?.....

How can it be applied? COSHH from first principles involves evaluation and selection at the procurement stage. Follow the instructions on the container. End of.

Here is where COSHH enters the real world and those designing the law did not envisage nor take account of such working circumstances nor any circumstance where data sheets are not available noting that the philosophy of what is 'reasonably practicable' needs to be fully understood even with regards to COSHH I advise [after working in such areas for 17 years] that you take note of Bob T etc. and use common sense and there are many laws etc. connected to this sector all of which must be accounted for and COSHH is only one of them so a balance needs to be struck The LA, NHS and SS are offloading as much as they can with regards to these work area sectors to the private sector and never did proper assessments themselves [I have worked for ~10 LA's in my time] and do not now as far as I aware; so again they want higher standards than they have themselves I facilitated in creating a master COSHH RA that accounted for all foreseeable areas in this sector where private substances [data sheets are not provided for domestic purchases] were used by staff in such situations and thereafter created workable and easy systems for staff to follow and I suggest that U do the same noting that what is RP in the circumstances must be evaluated &applied Additionally U need to talk to the LA's inhouse H&S bods as they should have a good handle on this & should be able to support U and I have found that QA systems/ In-house LA auditors have no allowances /place for such situations best of luck

Bob - you are spot on the money here. The LA who are the commissioners for these services expect a higher standards than they have themselves, which is fundamentally wrong and frustrating. NOTE: The common sense approach sounds great until and injury occurs and you come under the scrutiny of the commissioners, loved ones or the regulators (HSE, CI, CQC etc) or a lawyers letter drops on your desk for a claim, and you only defence is 'we have a common sense approach' believe me I have been there. Ron

here here Ian One other thing to consider is that people who really want to work in this area actually care for their clients so they will put their client above other matters in a different way to people putting their jobs first in a warehouse, construction site, office etc. so the caring factor must also be accounted for And if we are too formal this can sometimes be a backward step and will not help a care plan nor respect for the client noting that most of the people in care today went through a war or even two or more wars so our 'little hazards today are meaningless' to them as was noted to me by a 90 year old client recently best of luck

I have learned something new! I am surprised that home carer staff were expected to use the clients' own cleaning products, rather than bringing their own. Apart from the COSHH issue, what would they do I they found themselves working in a house with no cleaning products available?