Just when you think you’ve dealt with every possible business expense and it’s smooth sailing for the time being at least, along comes another outgoing you could really do without. Suffice to say therefore, when and where any kind of expense can be put to one side for as long as realistically possible, this tends to be exactly what most business owners will do.
Take if you will the example of automatic hand dryers – how many businesses and offices have you visited over recent years where the hand dryers in the bathrooms were about as much use as empty cardboard boxes nailed to the walls? The answer is probably quite a few, or at least a handful, but in any case it pretty well illustrates the fact that these are the kinds of genuine essentials that tend to take a rather the long backseat to everything else.
Unfortunately, when and where things like hand dryers are overlooked in terms of their importance, basic health and safety in the workplace also goes overlooked. After all, you don’t simply invest in these things in the first place just for the sake of it – they play an important role in the health and safety of everyone in the workplace. As such, when and where the time comes that it’s obvious you are in need of an upgrade, there’s really no excuses for not doing so.
And in terms of knowing when and where an upgrade is needed, tick any of the following boxes and today it should really be the day you think about making the switch:
1 – They Just Aren’t Cutting It
First of all, if it’s become painfully obvious that your hand dryers are by this stage doing absolutely nothing at all other than take up space, annoy your employees, discourage your guests and generally consume electricity for no good reason, you are fighting a lost battle. Contrary to popular belief, there isn’t a hand dryer on the market which at the time of purchase blows painfully cold air out at the slowest speed imaginable doing little other than make hands colder than they were in the first place. This is a sign of age and disrepair and should not be ignored or just accepted as inevitable.
2 – They’ve Become Overbearing
The same also applies to any hand dryers which have degraded to such a point where each and every time that they are used, those in the vicinity would be best advised to use industrial-grade ear defenders. Some hand dryers will be inherently louder than others, but there’s a difference between a hand dryer that’s loud and one that sounds like a jet taking off each time the button is pressed. Quite simply, this is another example of a sign that the dryer is well and truly on its last legs and could do with being replaced before causing any more of a nuisance.
3 – Your Energy Bills Are Soaring
If there are plenty of hand dryers around the workplace and each has been allowed to degrade to such a point as efficiency is well and truly a thing of the past, chances are this will wreak havoc with your energy bills. These days hand dryers are designed to be considerably more energy efficient than they were in years gone by, but with time and with general wear and tear, efficiency will inevitably begin to suffer. As such, if you are currently operating a small arsenal of hand dryers which are no longer running efficiently, exactly how much money you are wasting of energy doesn’t bare thinking about.
4 – They Constantly Need Repairing
Despite the fact that so many of us do it instinctively, there is absolutely nothing to gain from retiring something over and over and over again when it would in fact cost you less long-term to replace it with something superior. This is exactly what happens up and down the country all the time when it comes to electronic hand dryers as rather than biting the bullet and simply upgrading to newer, more efficient and more reliable models, businesses throw vast sums of money down the drain on repeat repair jobs. Suffice to say, flogging a dead horse will never get you far.
5 – They Look and Sound Like They’re About to Fall Apart
Last but not least, if you have any kind of common sense in your head – which of course you do – it should be pretty obvious when and where your own hand dryers have reached the end of their tether and are days, weeks or even just moments away from falling to pieces. Try not to forget that while most hand dryers are as safe as can be, any electronic appliance that has been allowed to fall into a state of disrepair is technically a hazard waiting to happen…and a potentially expensive hazard at that.