The scenario in this article is illustrative. It is a composite drawn from themes that come up often in workplace assessments, and it describes no real person, employer or report.
An office administrator has had hearing loss since her thirties. She wears hearing aids during the day and takes them out at lunchtime to rest her ears. During a routine fire drill, she was in a quiet room on the second floor with her aids out. She did not hear the alarm, and she did not notice colleagues leaving until the room had emptied. The drill was an exercise. The thought of a real event has stayed with her.
She has told her manager she is “fine”. She is not sure it is reasonable to ask for anything, and does not want to be treated as a risk.
Why alarms need a second route
Most workplace alarms are designed to be heard. For a person with hearing loss, particularly when hearing aids are out or the person is in a quiet room, an audible alarm may be missed or not heard clearly. The same applies to announcements, which many people with hearing loss find hard to understand even when they are loud.
This is a health and safety point, not a judgement on the person. It means that a second route for the alert, visual or vibrating, may be worth considering, along with a plan for what the person does when the alarm sounds. Responsibility for fire safety sits with the employer, through its fire risk assessment. A workplace assessment can raise the question and describe what the person reports. It does not carry out a fire risk assessment, and it does not decide what is required.
How the referral happens
In this scenario, the administrator mentions the drill to her manager when asked how it went. The manager, with her agreement, asks HR to arrange a hearing loss workplace assessment. The referral describes the building and role in general terms and asks what the employer could do. It does not ask the assessor to certify the building’s safety.
What the assessment involves
The assessment can be carried out by video call or in person. The assessor first looks at her job: where she works in the building, with whom she communicates, and how information reaches her. Phone calls, meetings, team announcements, deliveries and visitors all come into it.
The conversation then turns to her hearing at work. Where is it hardest? What can she follow in the office, in meeting rooms and in the kitchen? What happens to her day when her aids are out? What does she do about alerts, such as the door entry system or the phone?
In this scenario she explains that she follows conversation well in a quiet room with her aids in, but not at all without them, that she misses announcements made over the building’s system, that she cannot reliably hear the fire alarm unless her aids are in and the room is quiet, and that nobody has asked her about it before. She also says that in team meetings she depends on watching faces, which is harder when people turn away or the room is dim.
The assessor records what she describes, and also asks whether the employer’s fire procedures have considered people who may not hear the alarm. The assessment does not assess the building or its fire systems.
What the report recommends
The report is a workplace adjustments report. It is non-clinical and each recommendation stands alone with a reason tied to something she described. Items that need an employer decision are put to her line manager. In this scenario, recommendations might include the following.
| Barrier reported | Possible adjustment | Why it may help |
|---|---|---|
| May not hear the fire alarm when aids are out or in a quiet room | A visual or vibrating alert at her workstation and in rooms she uses, linked to the building’s alarm, for the employer to specify through its fire safety arrangements | May help the alarm reach her by a route she can notice |
| Uncertainty about what to do in an evacuation | A personal emergency evacuation plan agreed with her, covering how she is alerted, who knows, and where she goes | May give her and her colleagues a clear plan and reduce anxiety |
| Colleagues unaware of how she is alerted | A named colleague or fire warden who knows her plan and checks for her during an evacuation | May provide a back-up if the alert is missed |
| Missed announcements | Important announcements also sent by message or shown on screens | May give her a second route to the same information |
| Depends on faces in meetings | Meeting practice: one speaker at a time, facing the group, with agendas in advance and a written summary of actions | May make speech easier to follow |
| Difficulty in meetings and calls | A remote microphone or live captions for key meetings, chosen with her hearing aids in mind | May improve the clarity of what she hears |
| Colleagues not aware of her needs | Deaf and hearing loss awareness training for her team and fire wardens | May help colleagues know how to attract her attention and what to do in an emergency |
The report is clear that the visual and vibrating alert, and the evacuation plan, sit within the employer’s own fire risk assessment and responsible person arrangements. It does not replace them.
What this might change
No adjustment restores hearing, and a fire alert is only part of an evacuation plan. What a package like this can do is remove the risk that she is the last to know, and give her and her colleagues a plan they have discussed in advance. In this scenario, a possible benefit is that she can work without the quiet worry about what would happen on the day.
For the employer, the point is that the drill showed something useful. Asking people about their needs before an incident is far better than discovering them during one.
What this means for occupational health, HR and case managers
Referrers can help by describing the building and the working pattern, naming who holds fire safety responsibility, and making clear that the employer will decide what to do with the safety recommendations. A hearing loss workplace assessment can raise the question and put the person’s account on record, but does not replace a fire risk assessment, audiology or occupational health input, and gives no view on fitness for work.
Avoid treating hearing loss as a reason to restrict where someone works. The aim of an evacuation plan is to make sure the person can get out safely, not to limit what they do.
Legal rights and support
Under the Equality Act 2010, a person is disabled where they have an impairment with a substantial and long-term adverse effect on their ability to carry out normal day-to-day activities. Schedule 1, paragraph 5 means the effect of hearing aids is ignored when deciding whether the definition is met. Where it is met, the employer must make reasonable adjustments. Access to Work, run by the Department for Work and Pensions, can help eligible people in England, Scotland and Wales with things like specialist equipment and communication support, but GOV.UK states that it does not cover reasonable adjustments an employer must legally make. Whether the definition is met for a particular person depends on their circumstances, and this article is general information rather than legal advice.
Summary
The administrator in this scenario was not at fault for a drill that she had not heard. The building had been designed to alert people by sound alone. A hearing loss workplace assessment helped her employer see the gap, and set out practical steps for alerting, evacuation planning and communication. The employer’s own risk assessment still decides how those steps are carried out.
Frequently Asked Questions
No. It is an illustrative composite, written to show how the assessment process works. It does not describe a real person, employer or report.
No. A workplace assessment records what the person reports and flags the question for the employer. Fire risk assessment is the employer's responsibility.
That depends on the employer's fire risk assessment and the circumstances. The report presents it as a recommendation for the employer and employee to discuss.
Participation needs to be voluntary. An employer cannot make someone disclose a condition, but it can make clear that support is available and keep the offer open.
If you or someone in your team is deaf or has hearing loss and would like expert, tailored support to stay productive and comfortable at work, visit https://visualisetrainingandconsultancy.com/workplace-assessments/hearing-loss-workplace-assessment/ to arrange a hearing loss workplace assessment.
Sources
GOV.UK, Access to Work: get support if you have a disability or health condition: https://www.gov.uk/access-to-work
GOV.UK, Access to Work, Eligibility: https://www.gov.uk/access-to-work/eligibility
GOV.UK, Definition of disability under the Equality Act 2010: https://www.gov.uk/definition-of-disability-under-equality-act-2010
legislation.gov.uk, Equality Act 2010, section 20: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/section/20
Acas, Reasonable adjustments at work: https://www.acas.org.uk/reasonable-adjustments
GOV.UK, Fire safety risk assessment: means of escape for disabled people: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/fire-safety-risk-assessment-means-of-escape-for-disabled-people
RNID, Make your meetings deaf aware: https://rnid.org.uk/employers-and-professionals/accessible-meetings/
legislation.gov.uk, Equality Act 2010, Schedule 1, Part 1: https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2010/15/schedule/1/part/1