I am currently sourcing a provider for on-line DSE Training and Assessment, I have narrowed the field down to two potential providers Cardinus and WorkWrite. We are a multinational company and I am interested in receiving comments, positive or negative, from anyone who uses or have used the above providers. Can you help?

Hi Cooper Recently I have done the elearning with the British Safety Council. Very good and rather painless. Once you have done the online training, you conduct a DSE assessment and send it to the BSC for verification. Give them a try. I found them easy and cheap to use. Cheers Reilly21943

We use Workrite. It does the job but a couple of annoyances arise. 1. The system emails an invitation to the user. The email has Workrite's logo so users initially deleted it. 2. The sequence is: training, test, workstation assessment. Users have tended to do the test, print their certificate and promptly forget about it. However, the system emails reminders to complete on a weekly basis. Users don't like this, especially when they're convinced they've finished. The sequence can't be changed so we just deal with the phonecalls.

Take a look at https://www.openerg.com/dse/ (Loughborough University Ergonomics Department) IT'S FREE!!! We used it as our DSE self assessment in a previous job. The individual goes through the set up, then does the assessment and gets the results emailed. The email can then be forwarded to a manager for recording and actioning - new chair, for example. It's as good as any commercial system AND IT'S FREE!

Hi This is a minor headache for me. The problem is the HR system that manages the constant comings and goings of people. I’d strongly urge that you ensure whatever system you choose is able to link with whatever HR system you have – and that the HR system actually does what it is supposed to do. Another issue I find is the reporting. There seems to be lots of high level reports on the system I use, but I’m singularly unable to get a report of all those registered users who have not done a risk assessment. I’d suggest looking at the reports you want, not the ones they say they can do for you. It’s easy to lose sight of what you want in this scenario. As with all computer systems it’s not until you populate it that you find the holes, and no supplier seems to provide a dummy system with a realistic population. Rant over… Graham

Some time ago I was involved in auditing several Cardinus users, so the following comments may not be fully up to date. The basic system is OK, the challenges come when managing the outputs from assessments. Someone needs to 'own' any resulting actions, this is particularly important when operating sites that are remote from the main IT resources, e.g. to ensure that any new/replacement equipment is suitably installed. Also someone has to monitor the overall data and, particularly, to ensure that reassessments are completed by individuals when due - a fairly thankless task as most office-based people don't see such tasks as high in their priority list once dome the first time. For larger workplaces with a clear FM role this can work well, but no so easy for smaller ones where there's no single person managing the office facility. Some particular weaknesses were: no system for assessing users with more than a single screen, or for screens used by more than one person, e.g. for shift operations.