Every employer in Great Britain must analyse the workstations their display screen equipment users work at and reduce the risks they find. This free DSE workstation assessment checklist is for health and safety leads, HR teams, office managers and trained DSE assessors. One run is one assessment of one user, at every place they do their screen work. Phase 1 confirms the person is a DSE user under the regulations and trains them. The user then completes their own self-assessment, and the assessor checks the display screen, keyboard and mouse, desk and chair, the environment, the software and the user’s breaks with them. Eye tests, training gaps and an action plan follow, and the manager approves the actions before anything is ordered. Homeworking checks appear for home and hybrid workers, laptop checks for laptop users, and an occupational health referral when the user reports discomfort.
Regulation 2 of the Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992 requires every employer to perform a suitable and sufficient analysis of the workstations their DSE users work at, to assess the risks to their health and safety, and then to reduce those risks to the lowest extent reasonably practicable. The HSE sums up the rest of the law in four duties: do a workstation assessment, reduce the risks (including breaks or changes of activity), provide an eye test if a user asks for one, and give users training and information. This checklist covers all four for one user.
It is not the only assessment a screen worker needs. The health and safety risk assessment covers every hazard in the workplace, and the DSE assessment goes deeper on one of them for one person. The home office setup checklist gets a remote worker’s equipment, network and security in place. Someone coming back after an injury or long illness starts with the return-to-work checklist, and their DSE assessment is often one of its adjustments.
Asks: is this person a DSE user, and do their screen, keyboard, desk, chair, environment, software and routine put their health at risk?
When: a new user or workstation, a change to the equipment or the work, a report of discomfort, and a review when the assessment may no longer be valid.
Output: the findings, an action plan with owners and dates, the eye test arrangements and the manager’s sign-off.
Asks: what could harm anyone at this workplace or in this activity, and what further action is needed?
When: before new work starts, after a significant change, and at the review date.
Output: the significant findings for the whole workplace. Screen work appears as one hazard, with DSE assessments for each user.
Asks: does the home worker have the space, equipment, connection and security to do the job?
When: at the start of a remote role or after a move.
Output: a working home office. The DSE assessment then checks that the set-up is safe for this user, and records it.
Eight phases take one assessment from planning to review. The user answers the self-assessment in Phase 2, and the assessor checks each part of the workstation with them. Phase 6 appears only for home and hybrid workers, the laptop checks only for laptop users, and the eye test and occupational health tasks only when they are needed.
Decide who is assessed and why, and train the user before they look at their own workstation. The HSE accepts a self-assessment only from a user who has been given suitable training.
The user answers first, at the desk where they normally work. The HSE’s legal guidance calls the user’s information an essential part of the assessment.
Regulation 4 requires the employer to plan the user’s work so that time at the screen is broken up by breaks or changes of activity. The law sets no length or frequency for them.
Shown only when the user works at home some or all of the time. The regulations apply to home workers, and where a user works both at home and in the office, the HSE says the assessment covers both.
The DSE Regulations are short: regulations 1 to 7 set the duties, and a Schedule sets the minimum requirements for the workstation. The table maps each duty to the phase that meets it, so you can show an inspector, or a user who raises a concern, where each one was done for this person. The wording follows the regulations as amended in 2002, which apply in England, Scotland and Wales.
| Duty | What the regulations say | Where the checklist covers it |
|---|---|---|
| Who is covered | A user is an employee who habitually uses display screen equipment as a significant part of their normal work (regulation 1). The regulations do not apply to portable systems not in prolonged use, among other exclusions. | Phase 1 records whether the person is a user, or treated as one under your policy, and why. |
| Assess the workstation | Every employer shall perform a suitable and sufficient analysis of the workstations used by their users, review it if it may no longer be valid or there has been a significant change, and reduce the risks found to the lowest extent reasonably practicable (regulation 2). | Phases 2 to 6 for the analysis, Phase 8 for the actions and the review triggers. |
| Meet the Schedule | Every workstation must meet the minimum requirements in the Schedule, for the screen, keyboard, desk, chair, space, lighting, glare, noise, heat, humidity and software, to the extent each part is present and the task makes the requirement appropriate (regulation 3). | Phases 3, 4 and 5, one task per part of the workstation. |
| Breaks | The employer shall plan users’ activities so that their daily work at the screen is periodically interrupted by breaks or changes of activity (regulation 4). | Phase 5: how the day is broken up, and breaks agreed where the job has none. |
| Eyes and eyesight | On request, the employer shall ensure an appropriate eye and eyesight test by a competent person, at regular intervals afterwards, and when a user has visual difficulties that may be caused by DSE work. Special corrective appliances for the work are provided where normal ones cannot be used and the test shows they are needed (regulation 5). | Phase 7: how to ask for a test, arranging it, and glasses for screen work. |
| Training | Adequate health and safety training in the use of any workstation the user may work at, before a new user starts, and again when the workstation is substantially modified (regulation 6). | Phase 1 before the self-assessment, and Phase 7 for gaps the assessment found. |
| Information | Adequate information on all aspects of health and safety relating to their workstation, and on the measures taken under the regulations (regulation 7). | Phase 8: what was found, what will change, and the arrangements for breaks, eye tests and training. |
When an assessment is needed. The HSE says employers must assess when a new workstation is set up, when a new user starts work, when a change is made to a workstation or the way it is used, and when users complain of pain or discomfort. Its leaflet INDG36 adds a review when the user changes workstation, the work changes considerably, or the controls in place may be causing other problems. The law sets no fixed interval.
What has to be written down. INDG36 says that with five or more employees you must record the significant findings, and that the record should be simple and focused on controls. With fewer than five there is no duty to write it down, but a record makes the next review easier. Northern Ireland has its own Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1992.
The user, the assessor and the manager are chosen on the first task. The self-assessment is assigned to the user, the checks to the assessor, and a home worker’s photos are uploaded to the task they belong to. When the user reports discomfort, the occupational health referral appears for the assessor with its own due date.
The sign-off is assigned to the manager alone, and nothing after the approval step can be completed until they record a decision. The chair, riser or footrest is then ordered against an approved plan, and the follow-up checks that it worked.
The Reports Grid shows each assessment in progress and the tasks that are overdue, so a promised footrest does not wait six months. If your policy checks in with users on a fixed date, a recurring schedule starts each one, and a move, new equipment or a report of discomfort starts its own run the same day.
CheckFlow does not judge whether a workstation is safe. That judgement is the assessor’s, recorded on each task with the user’s answers beside it. It runs the assessment around it: who answers, who checks, by when, and who approved the actions. CheckFlow’s HR checklist software shows how the same approach runs onboarding, leave and returns.
Start a new user’s assessment from the Employee Onboarding Checklist or, for someone who will work from home, the Remote Employee Onboarding Checklist. The Home Office Setup Checklist covers equipment, connection and security, and the Health & Safety Risk Assessment Checklist covers the rest of the workplace.
Health & Safety Risk Assessment Checklist
Home Office Setup Checklist
Return-to-Work Checklist
Remote Employee Onboarding Checklist
Employee Onboarding Checklist
Describe the process in a sentence and the AI checklist generator drafts the phases and tasks for you.
It is the analysis of a workstation that regulation 2 of the Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations 1992 requires for every DSE user. It looks at the whole workstation, including the screen, keyboard, mouse, desk, chair and the environment around them, the job being done and any special requirements of the person, such as a disability. Where there are risks, the employer must reduce them to the lowest extent reasonably practicable. The HSE’s DSE workstation checklist (CK1) is a free aid to doing one.
The regulations define a user as an employee who habitually uses display screen equipment as a significant part of their normal work. They set no number of hours. The HSE describes users as people who use DSE daily, for continuous periods of an hour or more, and its legal guidance says hard-and-fast rules based on hours of use are impossible because several factors combine. Part-time workers are judged the same way. Some employers simply treat everyone with access to DSE as a user.
Yes, where the home worker is a DSE user. The HSE says the regulations can apply to people who work at home permanently or long term, and to hybrid workers who split their time between the workplace and home. You do not usually need to visit: a trained worker can complete a self-assessment. Where someone works both at home and in the office, the assessment should cover both. If it shows they need equipment, such as a screen or a chair, they cannot be charged for it.
The regulations set no fixed interval. Regulation 2(2) requires a review when there is reason to suspect the assessment is no longer valid, or there has been a significant change. The HSE lists the triggers: a new workstation, a new user, a change to the workstation or the way it is used, a user complaining of pain or discomfort, a change of workstation, or a big change in the work. Some employers also check in with users on a fixed date as policy. The last task in this checklist records the triggers.
If you are a DSE user, yes for the test. Your employer must arrange an eye and eyesight test when you ask for one, and pay for it. The HSE says it should be a full test by an optometrist or doctor. Your employer only has to pay for glasses if the test shows you need special glasses prescribed for the distance you view the screen at, and then only for a basic pair of frames and lenses. If your ordinary glasses are suitable, they do not have to pay.
Yes, if they have been trained to. The HSE says users can fill in the workstation checklist themselves when suitably trained, and that their information is an essential part of the assessment. But the self-assessment is not the end of it. A trained assessor should look at the results, clear up doubtful points, give the user feedback and make sure problems are put right. The HSE says the same of assessment software: it can help, but it is not an assessment on its own.
They exclude only portable systems not in prolonged use. The HSE’s legal guidance says a laptop that a DSE user works on habitually, for a significant part of their normal work, is covered. Some of the Schedule’s detailed requirements may not suit a portable, but the work must still be assessed. The HSE recommends a separate keyboard and mouse, and a raised or separate screen, for prolonged laptop use. Think about the weight users carry between locations too.
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