Lone worker safety in the UK starts with the law: working alone is legal, but your employer must assess the extra risks of lone work and put controls in place: training, a way to keep in touch, a way to raise the alarm, and a plan for violence and emergencies. Health and Safety Executive (HSE) guidance says lone workers face the same hazards as anyone else, with a greater risk of harm because help is not close by.
Updated 2 October 2026 · Sources: Health and Safety Executive (INDG73 and lone working guidance), legislation.gov.uk, BSI, Suzy Lamplugh Trust
If you are threatened or hurt while working alone, get to safety and call 999 (or 112). If you can’t speak, stay on the line and follow the operator’s prompts: see how to make a silent 999 call.
A lone worker check-in plan, step by step
1. Agree where you’ll be
2. Check in at agreed times
3. Be able to raise the alarm
4. Confirm you’re back
5. Test it regularly
Based on HSE: training, supervision and monitoring of lone workers.
Who counts as a lone worker?
A lone worker is anyone who works by themselves without close or direct supervision. That includes delivery and taxi drivers, home carers and community nurses, estate agents doing viewings, cleaners and security staff working at night, shop staff on late shifts, engineers visiting homes, and people working from home. It applies to employees, and employers also have duties towards contractors and the self-employed.
What are an employer’s duties for lone workers?
Under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, employers must assess the risks to lone workers and control them. HSE guidance (INDG73) says that means training, supervision appropriate to the risk, a way to keep in touch, procedures for emergencies and violence, and attention to stress and mental health caused by isolation. Employers should involve workers in the risk assessment.
In the law itself, section 2 of the 1974 Act makes every employer ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of their employees, and regulation 3 of the 1999 Regulations requires a suitable and sufficient risk assessment. HSE adds that this covers anyone contracted to work for you, including self-employed people.
Lone working: who does what
How can I stay safe when visiting clients or customers alone?
The Suzy Lamplugh Trust, the UK’s personal safety charity, was set up after estate agent Suzy Lamplugh disappeared in 1986 while meeting a client. It publishes personal safety advice for lone workers.
What is a lone worker app or device?
It is a phone app or small device that lets someone working alone raise the alarm and be found. HSE mentions devices for raising the alarm, operated manually or automatically. The British Standard BS 8484:2022 is the code of practice for lone worker services: devices or apps plus monitoring, training and response. Phones also have free tools: Emergency SOS and live location sharing.
How often should a lone worker check in?
HSE does not set a fixed interval. Its guidance on monitoring lone workers says employers must keep in touch, using pre-agreed intervals of regular contact by phone, radio or email, plus a reliable system to confirm you have returned to base, tested regularly. How often depends on the risk assessment. Between check-ins, a noise-only personal alarm can help you get away.
Frequently asked questions
No. Working alone is legal and common. The law requires the risks to be assessed and controlled; for a few high-risk jobs, such as some work in confined spaces, working alone may not be acceptable.
Raise it with your manager, safety representative or union first. If that doesn’t work, you can raise a concern with the Health and Safety Executive.
They can, if someone actually monitors the alerts and knows what to do. An app is part of a plan, not a replacement for one.
Sources
- HSE: Protecting lone workers (INDG73)
- HSE: Manage the risks of working alone
- Suzy Lamplugh Trust
- HSE: Lone working: protect those working alone
- HSE: Training, supervision and monitoring of lone workers
- Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, section 2 (legislation.gov.uk)
- Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, regulation 3 (legislation.gov.uk)
- BSI: BS 8484:2022 Provision of lone worker services. Code of practice
General safety information, not legal advice. In an emergency, always call 999.
Keep reading
Working alone? Never be out of reach
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