A companion to floor safety
Slip Testing in Westmorland
How a floor’s grip is measured, graded and proven — with the detail kept in the margin, where you can glance at it.
Walk across a flagged inn floor in Kendal on a wet morning, or a care-home corridor in Appleby, and you are trusting something you cannot see — the grip between shoe and floor. This is a short companion to how that grip is measured, graded and proven, across the old county of Westmorland.
Slip resistance is invisible, and it changes as floors wear and cleaning routines shift. The Health and Safety Executive is clear on the stakes: slips and trips are the most common cause of major injury in UK workplaces. The reassuring part is that grip can be measured precisely — and we are independent and accredited to do exactly that.
The pendulum
The instrument that settles the question is the pendulum. A weighted arm swings a calibrated rubber slider across the floor to reproduce a slipping heel, and records a Pendulum Test Value — the PTV. It is the method the HSE prefers, and it works in the wet, where most slips happen. We test wet and dry, in three directions.
The surface itself
Where floors get contaminated — a kitchen, a dairy, a wash-down area — a second measure matters: surface roughness, or Rz, taken in microns. A floor needs enough microscopic texture to break through grease and water and still grip a shoe. Used alongside the pendulum, it shows how a floor is changing over time. We are accredited for both.
Whose duty it is
Under the Health and Safety at Work Act and the Workplace Regulations, every employer and occupier must keep floors safe so far as is reasonably practicable, and assess the risk. In care settings, the Care Quality Commission expects slip risk to be actively managed. A measured PTV is what turns ‘we clean regularly’ into evidence an insurer, the HSE or the CQC will accept.
Independent, and accredited
A test is only worth as much as the people behind it. This service is delivered by Surface Performance — an entirely independent laboratory with no connection to any flooring manufacturer, treatment company or equipment maker, and no commission from anyone. We test floors; we do not sell them, so nothing nudges the number. It is the same accredited work trusted on sites from Amazon and Gatwick to British Airways and the cruise line TUI.
By the numbers
The figures point one way. Some are HSE facts; the cost and reduction figures are industry estimates. Either way, measuring pays.
Across the old county
From Kendal and Kirkby Lonsdale to Appleby and the Eden valley, the southern lakes and the Howgills — the LA and CA postcodes of the historic county, and nationwide beyond. See coverage →
Get a quote
Have your floors read
Send the surface type, the rough area in square metres and where you are in Westmorland. A fixed, no-obligation quote comes back — usually the same working day.
Independent and ISO/IEC 17025 accredited (UKAS Testing Laboratory No. 7933). We test floors; we don’t sell flooring or treatments.