Guide to working in people’s homes Page 5 of 24
Introduction
This guide provides practical advice to health and community service organisations about how
to manage work health and safety for community workers working in people’s homes.
The guide outlines many common hazards found in the community services sector, primarily in
the home environment, and provides solutions based on the principles of risk management.
It is important for all relevant parties, including clients and primary carers, to work together to
identify work health and safety risks and the best ways to manage them.
Terms used in this guide
Client – a person receiving a service in their home.
PCBU – is a person conducting a business or undertaking alone or with others, whether or
not for profit or gain. A PCBU can be a sole trader (for example a self-employed person), a
company, unincorporated association or government department or agency. A PCBU is
often, but not always, an employer. A ‘volunteer association’ is not a business or
undertaking under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011. A ‘volunteer association’ is a
group of volunteers working together for one or more community purposes that does not
employ anyone to carry out work for the association. Unless otherwise stated, where the
word ‘employer’ is used in this guide it is referring to a PCBU.
Primary carer – a person who provides personal care, support or help to a client and is not
engaged as a paid or volunteer worker, often a family member or guardian.
Worker – a person who carries out work in any capacity for a person conducting a business
or undertaking. Examples of health and community care workers include personal carers,
care providers, nurses, social/welfare workers, therapists or other people performing health
care or community work at the direction of a person conducting a business or undertaking.
Workplace – is a place where work is carried out for a business or undertaking and
includes any place where a worker goes, for work. This includes a client’s home or part of
their home (for example kitchen), a vehicle or a community venue. A workplace where a
service is being undertaken in isolation from the assistance of other people because of
location, time or nature of the work is considered to be one where isolated work is being
undertaken.
Work health and safety – your duty of care
A PCBU (such as a service provider, or host employer of subcontractors or agency staff), has
the primary duty of care and must do what is reasonably practicable to ensure the health and
safety of their workers, including agency staff, subcontractors, volunteers, and others at the
workplace such as clients.
Participants in the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) can choose to engage a
disability service provider, an independent contractor (with their own ABN) or directly employ a
worker. When directly employing a worker or contracting work, plan nominees and participants
have a duty of care under the WHS Act 2011 as employers.
Workers, including subcontractors or agency staff, also have a duty of care to:
take reasonable care for their own health and safety
take reasonable care that they do not adversely affect the health and safety of others
comply, so far as they are reasonably able, with work health and safety instructions and
cooperate with the PCBU’s policies or procedures about work health and safety. This may
include following reasonable instructions relating to the delivery of the care plan, only
undertaking activities that have been agreed to in the client service agreement, and wearing