What's in this template?
This Working Alone and Lone Worker Policy gives Australian healthcare practices the document behind WHS Regulation 48: the duty to provide a system of work, including effective communication, for a worker doing remote or isolated work. It is built from Safe Work Australia's guidance on remote and isolated work in the healthcare and social assistance industry.
The template includes:
- The boundary against your After-Hours Care Policy, stated as a direct comparison so staff safety and patient service continuity are never confused
- A situation table to record exactly where lone or remote work happens in your practice: home visits, opening or closing alone, solo clinics, after-hours on-call
- A risk-matched communication and check-in system, from a simple scheduled check-in through to a monitored duress app for higher-risk home visits
- Vehicle and equipment controls for staff conducting home visits
- Appendix A: a check-in log for scheduled lone work
Editable placeholder fields
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A staff safety document, not a patient service document
The practice already has an After-Hours Care Policy that describes voicemail messages, deputising services and the nearest emergency department. This document is not a variation of that one. It answers a completely different question, for a completely different audience.
| This policy | After-Hours Care Policy | |
|---|---|---|
| Audience | Staff, under WHS Regulation 48 | Patients, under RACGP Criterion GP1.3 |
| Covers | How the practice keeps a worker who is alone or isolated safe: communication systems, check-ins, duress access | How a patient reaches appropriate care when the practice is closed: voicemail, deputising services, the nearest emergency department |
The two documents can describe the same hours of the day, a solo evening clinic being the clearest example, without describing the same thing. The After-Hours Care Policy is about the patient trying to reach care once that clinic ends. This policy is about the worker running it.
What the regulation actually requires
WHS Regulation 48 defines remote or isolated work as work that is isolated from the assistance of other people because of location, time, or the nature of the work. That is a broader test than "nobody else is in the building." A worker locking up alone at 9pm after a solo evening clinic, or a clinician driving to a home visit at an unfamiliar address, both meet it, even though neither looks like the classic image of someone working in a remote location.
The regulation's core duty is to provide a system of work that includes effective communication with the worker. Safe Work Australia's healthcare guidance is explicit that working alone or remotely both increases the risk of any job and can increase the severity of an injury, because help is not immediately available. It identifies work-related violence and poor access to emergency assistance as the two hazards that most often drive up the risk of remote or isolated work in healthcare specifically, which is why this template ties its higher-risk home-visit controls directly to the Occupational Violence and Aggression Policy's pre-visit risk assessment.
How to customise this template
- Download the Word document and replace every
{{placeholder}}with your details. - Complete Section 4 honestly. Most practices under-identify their own lone work because it does not look like "remote work" in the classic sense. Opening the building alone before the first appointment counts.
- Match the communication system in Section 5 to the actual risk, not a single system for everything. A home visit to an unfamiliar address is a different risk to locking up alone after the last patient leaves.
- Cross-reference the Occupational Violence and Aggression Policy for any home visit assessed as high risk, and confirm the rule that it is never attended solo.
- Brief staff on their right to decline an unsafe home visit environment on arrival, in Section 7.
- Review annually, or sooner after an incident involving a lone worker.
Related templates and tools
- Occupational Violence and Aggression Policy: the pre-visit risk assessment and response controls for a higher-risk home visit.
- After-Hours Care Policy: the patient-facing counterpart covering how patients reach care when the practice is closed.
- First Aid Policy and Needs Assessment: the portable kit requirement for vehicles used on home visits.
- WHS Incident Report Form: log any incident or missed check-in.
Frequently asked questions
Does this overlap with our After-Hours Care Policy?
No, even though both can describe the same time of day. The After-Hours Care Policy tells a patient how to reach care once the practice is closed. This policy tells the practice how it keeps a staff member safe while they are working alone or in isolation, which is a WHS duty owed to the worker, not a service commitment made to a patient. Keep both documents and cross-link them so the right one is easy to find.
What counts as "working alone" under WHS Regulation 48?
More than the obvious cases. The regulation's test is whether a worker is isolated from assistance because of location, time, or the nature of the work, which covers a solo evening clinic, opening the practice before other staff arrive, and a home visit, not only remote geographic locations. If in doubt, list the situation in Section 4 and assess it rather than assume it does not apply.
What communication system do we actually need?
It depends on the risk. A brief, low-risk period, such as opening the practice alone before others arrive, is reasonably covered by a scheduled check-in call or message. A higher-risk situation, such as a home visit to an address with an unknown or known risk of aggression, warrants a monitored duress app or device and a defined escalation if contact is lost. The template's Section 5 sets out this risk-matched approach rather than a single system for every situation.
Can a worker refuse a home visit they consider unsafe?
Yes. The template gives every worker the authority to leave, or decline to attend, a home visit environment they consider unsafe on arrival, and requires them to report it the same day so the address can be flagged for future visits. This is consistent with the general WHS right to cease or refuse unsafe work.
Do solo GPs need this policy?
A solo practitioner working entirely alone with no other staff has a different practical answer to Section 4 than a multi-GP practice, but the underlying question, who would know if something happened to me and how quickly, still applies, particularly for home visits and after-hours work. The template's situation table can be completed for a single-person practice just as it can for a larger one.
How does this relate to the Occupational Violence and Aggression Policy?
That policy owns the detailed risk assessment and response controls for aggression specifically, including the rule that a high-risk home visit is never attended solo. This policy owns the broader communication and check-in system for any lone or remote work, aggression-related or not, such as a medical event, a vehicle incident, or simply being unreachable longer than expected. Use both together for home visits.