Eyewash Stations
We use Cintas at one of our facilities. We have 5 stations and they charge $188/unit for their service. It's outrageous. What would I have to do to take this in house? Can I just buy wall mounted units? How often would I have to change out the contents of the units?
Comments (6)
Are you referring to Cintas changing out the water in the self-contained, non-pressurized eyewash units, such as the one at the link below? Or are you referring to Cintas just doing the weekly activation tests requried by ANSI?
If you want to stay with that style ("self-contained, non-pressurized eyewash"), they have to be visually inspected weekly to ensure the fluid is still good, as well as any additional requirements from the manufacturer. There's no "training", per se - you just have to refer to the manufacturer to know when the fluid needs to be changed out, as well as any additional manufacturer-specific requirements not mentioned in the ANSI Z358.1 standard.
Personally, I think all wall-mounted stations are terrible. The portable saline bottles are not considered "eyewash stations" and do not meet the requirements for them if you're required to have one (e.g., near injurious corrosive chemicals). The self-contained, non-pressurized eyewash stations mentioned above are very low flow and not the best. If possible, I'd highly recommend a plumbed unit, but I understand your site-specific situation may not allow that.
https://www.eyewashdirect.com/collections/portable-eyewash/products/haws-7501-eye-wash-station-c1977978
I have worked at a facility that did them in house, with a mix of plumbed units and refillable non pressurized units. I am working now at my current facility to take them in house as well, Activation, Inspection, and cleaning can be done in house easily (assuming you have the head count to dedicate the time). For any self contained units, the frequency of changing the water in them depends on the preservative additive you put in. Read the instructions on the additive and it will tell you when you should change out the water.
Grainger and ULINE offer several wall mount and free-standing emergency eye wash units. The cartridges are fairly easy to replace if/when discharged. There is also a unit that you would refill with a solution and water. I didn't like that unit because the solution inside the unit would start to get "skunky" and didn't want that discharging into someone's eyes.
You are likely tied into a contract (probably 3 years) with Cintas. My company signed a contract before I was hired for eye wash inspections monthly & I just raised the question because changing out the solution twice a year isn't a hard task unless your site is really remote. I was sent the contract that we could cancel but would have to pay the rest of the "rental service" for the remaining 1.5 years, which basically means they get paid without performing the service. Moral of the story - don't sign contracts for service agreements if there is any chance someone on staff can do simple tasks like this or restocking first aid supplies or inspecting an AED that take 5-10 min/month. Cost analysis - even if it takes an employee 30 min, you would be effectively paying like $500 minus the employees hourly wage which is likely not more than $50/hr. Now if you run a site with a million sf & 10,000+ employees, this is a great service if you don't have a system in place for each building or department (& cost benefit is more favorable).
What kind of eye wash stations? The plumbed ones or the "self-contained"?
The plumbed ones that is a lot!
Self-contained not to bad if they are changing out the packs.
When I first started consulting 8 years ago I was doing an Mock OSHA audit if a customer. I was looking over a self-contained eye wash station. I had never had any expereince with them as we always had plumbed stations when I was site manager for coporations. By mistake I activated this eye wash station on one side. One of the packets was used. I felt so bad I offered to pay for the bag myself. The company sent me a bill from their PPE vendor for $280 for one pack for their eye wash station. That really ate into my profit on that job!
Why not maintain them yourself? Easy! Buy the ANSI standard on eye wash stations and just follow that, for $30. I was along time customer of Cintas. let's just say they do not ask me for recommendations? Don't ever sign a contract with them!
If you have plumbed units there is a company that makes tester devices so that it is not so much a chore and messy.
https://greengobblersafety.com/
They are a little pricey, though, if you have quite a few and are paying quite a bit for servicing then it might be more economical to have one and do it yourself inhouse. We had a young kid that was the son of one of our techs that was working part time for us make a cart up that entailed the T-Bowl from Green Gobbler for catching water coming out of the drain and then a utility cart outfitted with a plastic storage container that he installed a spigot at the bottom. He cut a hole down through the cart and into the lid of the storage container so that the shower tester chute could fit down through it. Keeps everything for the most part dry and easy to empty.