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Health & Safety at Work Training

Everyone has a part in making workplaces a safe place to be, this Virtual College CPD approved health and safety at work course is suitable for anyone looking to gain or refresh their health and safety knowledge. The course informs why it is so important to follow the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. Meet legal obligations for health and safety training and receive an instant digital certificate with this course.

This course was reviewed and updated in February 2025

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Course Overview

Format

  • Intermediate
  • 45 Minutes - 1 Hour
  • Online Study
  • Self-Printed Certificate

Accreditation

  • 1 CPD Hour
  • CPD Certified
  • RoSPA Assured

Course description

Everyone wants to stay safe and healthy, and that’s why health and safety (H&S) at work is enshrined in law. Being unwell or put at risk of harm has wide implications for both the individual affected and the business they work for.

When the Health and Safety at Work Act came into force in 1974, businesses were now responsible for keeping their employees safe and well. That included training them regularly in how to do that.

This short course on Awareness of Health and Safety at Work helps you understand the importance of this topic. You’ll find out about the key principles: how to recognise and control hazards, how to prevent accidents and how to communicate health and safety information. Employers can use this course to comply with their obligations to legislation.

By taking this e-learning health and safety awareness course, you'll meet your legal obligations, minimise the risk of bad publicity or lawsuits for your company, gain awareness of health and safety issues and be able to demonstrate your understanding of health and safety laws.

Everyone has a role to play in ensuring their own health and safety at work, as well as that of their colleagues.

What's covered in this Awareness of Health and Safety at Work course?

Our online Health and Safety at Work training course is broken down into the following sections and can be completed at your own pace, the course includes:

Module What it includes
Introduction and Learning Outcomes The course starts with a short introduction to explain what it covers and some of the key terminology around workplace health and safety. This part also covers what you'll learn in the course and explains how the final assessment works. There is also a short self assessment which helps you find out how confident you are on the topic.
Safety Principles and Leiglsation In the opening part of the course we look at who is responsible for health and safety and why health and safety matters. It also explains the key legislation and how that is applicable to you and three scenario based knowledge checks to ensure your have understood the course content so far. To finish off this part of the course there's a summary of responsibilities interactive challenge.
Risk Assessments Covered in this part of the course is everything you need to know about risk assessments including how they fit in, their aims and how you can contribute to a safe workplace. There's also a knowledge check and an interactive challenge to reinforce what is covered here.
Physical Hazards and Safety Procedures This part of the course covers various topics including slips and trips, handling, lifting and carrying, work equipment, working at height and fire safety. Within this section there are a number of knowledge checks and interactive challenges on the topics learnt.

Health and Wellbeing

In the penultimate part of the course we look at an important part of health and safety which may be overlooked, your personal mental health and wellbeing and those around you. It includes a scenario based video, knowledge checks and interactive challenges.

Special Circumstances

The final part of the health and safety training looks at a number of special circumstances which can affect your health and wellbeing such as conflict, communication, lone working, COSHH and more. There are several interactive elements and challenges to try along the way.

Why take this Awareness of Health and Safety course?

Awareness of Health and Safety at Work is designed to teach both employees and employers why health and safety in the workplace is so important in relation to the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

By taking this e-learning health and safety awareness course, you'll meet your legal obligations, minimise the risk of bad publicity or lawsuits for your company, gain awareness of health and safety issues and be able to demonstrate your understanding of health and safety laws.

Health and Safety in the Workplace Course Duration

This health and safety awareness course should take 45 minutes to one hour to complete, but e-learning is self-paced, so it depends entirely on your individual learning speed and how quickly you absorb the study material.

Your progress is automatically saved along the way so you can complete the training at your convenience.

Accreditation

Our Awareness of Health and Safety training course is RoSPA assured and their logo will be included on your certificate.

This health and safety in the workplace course has also been certified as conforming to universally accepted Continuous Professional Development (CPD) guidelines.

Certification

After completing this health and safety in the workplace course, you will be able to download and print a Virtual College health and safety awareness certificate for your records.

To complete the course you will need to pass our online assessment with a score of 80% or over, the assessment is made up of 15 multiple choice questions.

Entry requirements

There are no specific entry requirements for this workplace health and safety course.

Further online training courses

We have over 300 accredited online courses and a wide selection of health and safety courses including Complete Health & Safety PackageIOSH Working Safely and Health, Safety & Welfare.

View our full catalogue of online courses here.

You will learn

  • Key terms in Health and Safety and describing responsibilities of employers and employees according to legislation
  • The purpose of a risk assessment and how to conduct one
  • Identifying, removing and mitigating against hazards in various types of working environments
  • How mental health and other aspects of wellbeing are important at work
  • The unique challenges some people face at work

Who is it for?

Roles including:

  • Anyone working in an office, retail, construction, food/catering, manufacturing, warehouse, hospital or hospitality environment
  • Quite simply put this course is suitable for anyone and has been designed to help keep you and those around you at work safe

Legislation

Legislation covered in this course includes:

The content of this course will help employers and employees address the legal obligations around the main piece of health and safety legislation - Health and Safety at Work 1974.

This legislation places a duty of care on employers to ensure that the health, safety and welfare of all employees are adequately taken into consideration. By taking this course, you are helping to uphold the high standards of health and safety within your workplace and meet the legal obligations around health and safety in the workplace.

Awareness of Health and Safety at Work FAQs

  • Do you need certificates to be a health and safety officer?

    After completing this health and safety in the workplace course, you will be able to download and print a Virtual College health and safety awareness certificate for your records. This health and safety in the workplace course has been certified as conforming to universally accepted Continuous Professional Development (CPD) guidelines.

    See more about our Health and Safety courses here as well as our packages.

  • Why is health and safety awareness important in the workplace?

    Health and safety is something that everyone is aware of and impacted by at work. If you’re an employer and/or a business owner, business health and safety laws will influence many of the decisions you make, which in turn can impact the success of your organisation.

    The importance of health and safety in the workplace is linked to a wide range of factors, so ensuring that your business is safety compliant should be a priority. Following guidance and complying with laws should be more than just a box-ticking exercise - it’s something that you should always be striving to do to keep employees and customers safe.

    See this article where we look at the different factors which contribute to health and safety being a major consideration for employers and employees.

  • Why is health and safety awareness training important?

    Awareness of Health and Safety at Work is designed to teach both employees and employers why health and safety in the workplace is so important in relation to the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974.

    By taking this e-learning health and safety awareness course, you'll meet your legal obligations, minimise the risk of bad publicity or lawsuits for your company, gain awareness of health and safety issues and be able to demonstrate your understanding of health and safety laws.

    Learn more about the importance of health and safety by clicking here.

How the online courses work

  • Find a course

    To begin searching for your online training you can click on the course category section on our website and browse through all of our training categories.

    Alternatively if you already know the title of the training you’re looking for you can use the search bar located in the centre of the homepage and go directly to the course you want.

  • Buy the course

    When buying one of our courses, you will need to enter a valid email address which will be used to create your account with our Learning Management System – Enable – where you will take the training. We will also send your purchase receipt to this email address, and any additional courses purchased in future using the same email address will be added to your system account.

    Once you have purchased a course, you will be able to send this course to other people using your system account with Enable by entering the new learner’s email address so that they may access the training and set up their own system account with our Learning Management System.

    If you are not 100% satisfied with your course then we offer a 30-day, no hassle money-back guarantee. To request a refund, you should email our learner support team with your receipt stating why you would like to be reimbursed. You, or your learners, must not have completed the training in order to make a valid refund claim. Any claim made after the training has been completed will be invalidated.

  • Take the course

    This online course consists of a series of pages in which an instructor will talk learners through the lesson material. Pages may include supporting pictures, graphs, animation or extra sounds to help with the learning where appropriate. Some lessons will include challenges/quizzes to help learners stay engaged and interested in the material. Lessons can be taken in any order and each lesson may be paused and resumed at any stage.

    The course is self-paced so learners decide how fast or slow the training goes. There is no deadline for completion but some of our courses have a test at the end to check that learners have understood the material. If the course has a test at the end then learners are required to achieve a 75% pass mark to successfully complete the course. Once learners have passed the test they are awarded a certificate, which can either be downloaded digitally or sent as a physical copy if this option was chosen when purchasing the course.

  • Your Certificate

    Upon completion of any of our courses, learners will be able to download a digital certificate from Virtual College which will include the accrediting bodies logo where applicable, the learner's name, the title of the course and the date of completion.

    If you have purchased the posted certificate option, available on selected courses, a high quality, seal embossed, certificate will be sent out the following working week after completion.