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Posted By Geoff Burt
An employee has recently paid £198 for a pair of spectacles with 'basic' frames and prescription lenses from a High St optician. A certificate has been provided by the optician showing that the glasses are needed solely for working with VDUs. Am I alone in thinking these sort of costs must, surely, be outside the intent and spirit of the DSE regulations?
Does anybody have an idea of the general range of prices for basic specs, and if possible, details of suppliers they would recommend.
Thanks
Geoff
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Posted By Tony Birchall
Geoff,
That seems excessive. I would ask for a break down in terms of how much the frames were.
Prescription lenses can be expensive, depending upon the prescription type, but you can purchase frames nowadays for about 35 pounds.
The average cost for prescription safety spectacles is around 55 pounds I thought! (single vision). Maybe 75 pounds bifocal and 100 ish for variofocal.
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Posted By Ron Young
Hi Geoff,
To comply with the DSE Regs, we provide a £50 voucher for basic "corrective appliances" and we have not had any complaints. Other fellow H&S managers who I have contact with have similar policies in place. When I worked H&S in manufacturing, the costs Tony Birchall alluded to were about right but I now believe that a National chain can do safety specs at £44. I would think that £198 is extracting the urine.
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Posted By Ken Lucas
Geoff
Similar to Ron. My previous organisation paid for the initial eye examination/test and also the frames (from a specific range). The cost borne by the organisation would be approximately £70.
If the employee wanted different frames to those offered, he/she would have to pay the extra. The lens costs had to be paid by the employee. Again no complaints - all seemed happy.
Regards the suppliers, they used a local optician as opposed to a large national chain, reason being there was a greater amount of flexibility to negotiate a good "deal" on the basis of very regular business.
Everyone's a winner.
Ken
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Posted By John Ridd
The wording in the Guidance to the Regs is:"Employers' liability for costs is restricted to payment of the cost of a basic appliance, ie of a type and quality adeqeuate for its function. If users wish to choose more costly appliances ... the employer is not obliged to pay for these."
If the Optician is saying that the £198 payment was required to meet these criteria, then I would be inclined to make arrangements with a different company - "Employers are free to specify that users' tests and corrections are provided by a particular company or professional."
On a point of ergonomics - I would not sanction the provision of bifocal lenses for VDU use; indeed, it is in particular those people wearing bi-focals who I would often advise to get a prescription for single focal length VDU lenses. Even varifocal lenses are often unsuitable.
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Posted By Ian Stone
We arrange for a local optician to come in on a monthly basis to test a few people at a time, we then give £50 vouchers to pay for any glasses, if the person wants to apy more then they can.
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Posted By Sarah J Shaw
Just to add my five pennies worth. We provide both DSE and safety glasses the costs break down as follows for the DSE users:
£15 for the eye and eyesight test
£45 for the prescription including lenses
If you have a lot of users you can get travelling opticians who will visit your site to do the tests, charges for this are approx £10.
We use a company where we send away for the prescription and you can get frames for under £30, but this could cause some problems.
As the others have stated, our policy then states that any costs above this must be paid for by the employee. If you want a copy e-mail me.
Sarah
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Posted By Sarah J Shaw
Sorry forgot to add to my comment that this is for single a single polycarbonate lense.
You can also get charged a dispensing fee of about £10. This is to ensure the spectacles site correctly, are comfortable etc.
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Posted By Ken Taylor
I think that local charge differences may apply. You don't seem to get much change from £100 in some areas.
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Posted By David J Bristow
Hi Geoff
We have to date paid for 4 employees to have eye tests, all of which were complaining of eye strain/headaches.
Not one of the employees needed to wear glasses specifically for VDU use.
Our policy is to pay a sum of £40.00 for a basic pair and then if the employee wants an upgrade they pay the difference.
Were empoyers pay for special glasses then surley they have the right to state that the glasses are for work only and not for home use - however, monitoring staff to ensure they dont take them home would take time out from our real job.
Regards
David B
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Posted By Michael Webb
We provide our staff with 'Eyecare Vouchers' from a company called Accor (020 7887 1234)to the tune of £45. We spoke to several local opticians (both large and small companies) and concluded that £45 would pay for basis corrective appliances. Prior to issuing them, we spoke to local opticians to ensure they would receive these vouchers!
Hope this is of some help.
Mike
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Posted By Robert K Lewis
Can be a problem this when you remember that such glasses fall into the PPE definition, at least in my view. The PPE regs make wearer comfort a decision point. There are always going to be some people who find the basic uncomfortable and I would be hesitant about rigidity concerning costs. I think much above £100 has to be treated as a try-on however and the optician is worthy of more close attention.
Bob
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Posted By Ian Minty
My organisation pays the first £50 pounds.
But we are in discussion at the moment because 2 years have elapsed since I received them and the lenses are now badly scratched and my employer will only pay towards another pair if my prescription has changed. I disagree with this as the pair that I have are now substandard and I think that they should be paying towards a replacement pair.
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Posted By peter gotch
Geoff,
We have national contract with Specsavers with standard charges UK wide for eye tests, and where required single vision or bifocal corrective appliances.
After many hundreds of tests over several years, noone has suggested that the basic frames and lenses are not suitable for DSE use - as opposed to routine near and far vision. For single vision, we are at the bottom end of the numbers quoted in this thread to date.
May be there could be people with particular vision problems which need one off attention - suggest these would fall within remit of Disability Discrimination Act - which could preclude DSE work in some cases, and indicate need for reasonable adaptations in others.
Which failing whoever is quoting £180 is at it!!
Peter
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Posted By Geoff Burt
Lots of responses and with similar ideas.
I've can now go back to the client with details of various suppliers and approximate costs.
I think they will have to let this one go but it does show the importance of putting proper arrangements in place before they are needed rather than waiting for a 'test case'.
Thanks for all the inputs both on the forum and by email.
Geoff
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Posted By Dave Whitfield
Geoff,
Like one of the other replies, we use Specsavers now. You simply ring your local branch and they send out a ring binder with a pad of easy to fill in forms.
There is a choice of 6 or 7 different frames all at the same price. The other bonus is that your employees can ring to request a voucher pack with which they and their family can save over 25% on other glasses, if they use them.
All in all, the service has been excellent, the costs are very cheap, and it allows employees to attend their nearest Specsaver outlet (great if like me you live a long way away from where you work).
I hope this is of some help.
Regards
Dave Whitfield
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Posted By Mark Large
My company uses Specsavers too.
We have a corporate scheme with them whereby should specs be required the user can choose from a £30 and £46 range. We are invoiced.
I think we could defend it if we only offered the £30 range. They allow them to see the screen don't they!
If they want anthing more expensive than £46 they pay the extra themselves. The only expception to this was when someone had an allergy to most metals. Platinum was the only thing the could wear.
Varifocals aren't specific so don't come under the regs. You have no obligation to provide, its up to you to decide if you want to out of good practice. Do you really want the user to have to change glasses all the time?
Basically though price what is readily availble in your area. Add a little on top to appear to be giving some options and I think you have a defendable policy.
I'd be surprised if £200 is the going rate for basic specs in your area unless you work somewhere really upmarket.
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Posted By Ken Taylor
Presumably these £30, £40 and £50 deals don't include the frames and the lenses? What do the final costs come out at in your schemes? The last one I was involved with totalled £98 including frames from their 'standard range' and two lenses specifically prescribed for VDU use only.
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Posted By Mark Large
£16 for the test.
For £30 & £46 you get a basic frame and single vision lenses.
So if i send someone and they are prescribed £62 is the most I pay in total for the test and the specs.
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Posted By Sarah J Shaw
Ken
The prices I quoted were for the frames and the lenses inclusive.
Sarah
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Posted By Ken Taylor
Thanks Mark and Sarah. I suppose I am looking at Surrey prices. The Specsavers route sounds interesting. I shall have to contact them.
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Posted By Ian Mycroft
We also use Specsavers the eye test is £17 and we allow our employees to chose from the £39 range of frams which has several to choose from. If they want designer frames, they can have them, but we will still only contribute £39. Just a word of caution over Bi/Vari focals, one of our employees had problems with these, as he had to keep his head raised to view his screen through the right part of the lens. It was not easy to alter his screen height to compensate as other people had to use the workstation too, in the end the cheapest and most convenient solution was to provide him with a pair of single vision spectacles.
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Posted By Mark Large
Some sort of adjustable monitor arm might have done the trick with regard screen height.
That ain't cheap though.
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Posted By Dave Wynn
SPECSAVERS- 400 branches throughout the north west welcome company accounts provide vouchers for employees to visit branches for eye tests
charge £17 which includes specific report regarding VDU use (for your files)
cheap NHS type specs start at approx £38
which covers your emlpoyers obligation
decent specs start at about £48
NO before you ask I don`t work for them but we are about to set up an account!
hope this helps
Dave.
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Posted By Ian Mycroft
I think Specsavers should be giving some of us a discount for the recommendations.
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Posted By Mark Large
Funny you say that as they will probally furnish you with details of a discount scheme your employees would be eligible for.
I can't remember the details. The circumstance I'm in is that we can't advertise such schemes for political reasons.
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