Hopefully those employed by you are never injured on the job, but if they are, rules apply to when you must report the injuries. OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) has updated its severe injury rule requiring employers to notify the agency of a work-related death or hospitalization, amputation or loss of an eye .
Under this rule, employers must notify OSHA of work-related fatalities within eight hours, and work-related in-patient hospitalizations, amputations or losses of an eye within 24 hours. Prior to this update, OSHA’s regulations required a report only of work-related fatalities and in-patient hospitalizations of three or more employees.
This rule change will go into effect Jan. 1, 2015 for workplaces under federal OSHA jurisdiction. The new rule maintains the exemption for any employer with 10 or fewer workers from the requirement to keep records of injuries and illnesses.
All businesses covered by the Occupational Safety and Health Act are required to follow the new reporting requirements for severe injury and illness. OSHA is developing an online portal for employers to report incidents electronically, however reports may still be done by phone as well.
OSHA has also updated the list of industries that are exempt from the requirement to routinely keep injury and illness records. The new list is based on updated data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Any employer with 10 or fewer workers, regardless of their industry classification, is exempt from the record keeping rule.
It’s important to have safety procedures in place to prevent injuries, but no matter how diligent you are in training employees, accidents may happen. Knowing your reporting requirements for serious injuries or death is important to prevent fines for failing to make OSHA aware of the incidents timely.
To see the full rule, see OSHA rule.