Access to personal hygiene products should be provided to every employee regardless of their position and form of employment. Employers who do not fulfill this obligation violate the provisions of the Labor Code.

The Labor Code clearly indicates that the employer is obliged to provide each employee, without exception, with appropriate hygienic and sanitary facilities and to provide personal hygiene products. However, it does not specify to what extent and in what quantity they should be available to employees.

The Minister of Labor and Social Policy is in a hurry to provide an explanation. The regulation on general occupational health and safety regulations clarifies that the employer is obliged to provide personal hygiene products in the scope and quantity appropriate to the position performed and the degree of body contamination in connection with the work performed. This means that when employing employees performing manual work, the employer has more obligations towards them in terms of providing cleaning products than towards office workers. This does not mean, however, that when employing employees in positions that do not cause dirt, employers are exempt from this obligation. On the contrary – every employee has the right to wash their hands during the working day and in an unlimited amount.

The Labor Code and the issued implementing acts do not clearly regulate the type of personal hygiene products that the employer is obliged to provide to employees. Therefore, he should establish company standards himself and include them in the work regulations or employer’s order. As a rule, compensation for personal hygiene products provided to an employee is not allowed.

For blue-collar workers, it is necessary to provide traditional soap and towels. In turn, this is not necessary in the case of administrative and office workers. In their case, the employer will fulfill the obligation by guaranteeing cleaning products that each employee will be able to use in publicly accessible hygienic and sanitary rooms. This should be understood as soap dispensers for washing hands at sinks, paper or textile towels, hand dryers or toilet paper.

The obligation to provide employees with personal hygiene products also involves the need to appropriately arrange and arrange a hygienic and sanitary room, i.e.:

• locker rooms,
• washrooms,
• rooms with showers,
• passages,
• dining rooms except canteens,
• relaxation rooms,
• rooms for heating employees,
• rooms for washing, disinfecting, drying and dust removal of work clothes, footwear and personal protective equipment.

The requirements for rooms are included in Annex No. 3 to the Regulation of September 27, 1997 and depend on the number of employees, the type of work performed and the conditions in which it is performed and the technologies used.

Source:https://poradnikprzedsiebiorcy.pl/-obowiazek-zapewnieczenia-pracownikom-srodkow-higieny-osobistej

Supported by Norway through Norway Grants 2014-2021, in the frame of the Programme “Social Dialogue – Decent Work”.