Water safety might not be the flashiest item on your business checklist – but in 2025, it matters more than ever. Quietly, behind the scenes, your water systems could be harboring risks that are all too easy to miss.
The good news? With a bit of structure and some common-sense practices, keeping things safe doesn’t have to be complicated. The goal isn’t just to stay compliant. It’s to stay ahead.
What Do We Mean by “Water Safety”?
It’s not just clean drinking water, although that’s obviously one of the most important aspects. Business water safety covers everything from preventing Legionella outbreaks to managing dead legs in pipework, monitoring water temperature, and maintaining tanks, outlets, and filters.
Think of it like this: any system that stores, moves, or heats water has the potential to go wrong. Left unchecked, that can lead to bacteria build-up, equipment issues, or legal exposure.
Start With a Risk Assessment
Don’t think you can get away with one from five years ago, nor one based on how the building used to be used. A current, thorough water assessment is your foundation. It tells you where the vulnerabilities are and what needs fixing or monitoring.
But here’s the important thing: a risk assessment is only as useful as what you do with it afterwards. It’s not a document to file away. It’s something to revisit, especially if your building use changes, even slightly.
Get the Basics Right (Most Don’t)
You’d be surprised how many businesses miss the small stuff. Showers that aren’t flushed, hot water that doesn’t get hot enough, pipes that haven’t seen a flow of water in months. These things add up, and bacteria like Legionella thrive in exactly those conditions.
If your team isn’t clear on who’s responsible for weekly flushing, monthly temperature checks, or quarterly maintenance, now’s the time to fix that. Your approach doesn’t have to be complicated, but it does need to be consistent.
Make Water Safety a Habit, Not a Headache
This doesn’t need to result in overwhelming your team with new tasks. Rather, it’s a question of building smart habits. Use digital logbooks if they help, automate reminders, and most importantly, make sure people understand why the work they’re doing matters. Flushing a tap seems dull, until you realize what could happen if no one does it.
Training doesn’t need to be formal or expensive. Even a short refresher goes a long way when it comes to keeping things on track.
Use a Water Safety Plan
If you’re dealing with a hospital, care facility, school, or even a large office, you’ll probably want to go beyond the basics. That’s where a water safety plan comes in. It brings structure to your approach, mapping out risks, controls, roles, and contingency steps in a single document. This both makes water safety easier to achieve, and helps prove regulatory compliance if you ever need to do so.
Water safety in business used to be almost solely a question of compliance. These days, it’s about responsibility.
The businesses that pay attention now are the ones who avoid crisis mode later. It’s not just good practice – it’s good business.
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