How often do random drug tests need to be carried out?

With the misuse of drugs and alcohol becoming more prevalent in society, there is an increasing number of businesses who are implementing random drug and alcohol testing.

But how often should Workplace Drug and Alcohol testing be carried out?

As the name would suggest, the purpose of this type of drug testing is to be completely random, so that the times for testing are not predictable. This prevents employees from being able to ‘get around’ or ‘play’ the system to their advantage.

Ultimately it is you as an employer who will decide upon the frequency of testing, in line with your industry standards.

The most common approach is to run a programme with an element of random testing, which is an unannounced drug and alcohol test for a randomised proportion of the workforce.

This is often supported by a with-cause and/or a post incident test which is a drug and alcohol test carried out for a specific reason, such as after an incident has taken place.

In some circumstances these are also supported by a pre-employment testing programme which is a drug and alcohol test that can be carried out during the recruitment, screening and on-boarding process.

The proportion of randomised testing is wholly dependent upon the requirement of the employer and this can range from 5% to 100% of the workforce per annum.

The main focus of the employer should be ensuring that any drug and alcohol screening programme is operating fairly, through being proportionate to the workforce and the risk to co-workers and customers alike,