Want to keep OSHA away? Don’t skimp on reporting
“This could be the best thing OSHA has ever done,” said Mark Briggs, Area Director of OSHA’s South Houston office, referring to the expanse of useful information currently being gathered under OSHA’s new reporting rule for employers, which took effect January 1, 2015.
Now, OSHA must be notified anytime there is a workplace fatality, an in-patient hospitalization, an amputation, or an eye loss. The rule change has greatly increased the influx of reports to OSHA offices, which stretches their resources thinly and requires alternative means to follow-up on incidents. “It’s about all we talk about these days,” says JoAnn Figueroa, Area Director of OSHA’s North Houston office.
To better handle the surge in employer reporting, OSHA is allowing employers, in some cases, to conduct their own investigations in lieu of an OSHA on-site investigation. However, it is already evident that more than some employers are not forthcoming in their “investigations.” Doing everything possible to avoid an on-site visit from OSHA will likely be immediately seen as such, and you may get what you least want.
Rapid Response Investigations
To better handle the flood of information with its limited resources, OSHA has decided to triage each catastrophic report into three categories and respond with an on-site inspection or what is known as an “RRI” (Rapid Response Investigation).
Category 1:
Reports from employers involving fatalities, hospitalizations or two or more employees, repeat offenders, hazards covered by an emphasis program, injuries to minors, etc. will likely result in an on-site inspection from OSHA.
Category 2:
Reports from employers involving safety program failure (such as confined spaces, excavations, etc.), exposure to serious hazards (falls, electrocutions, etc.), temporary workers, repeat offenders, and employee complaints may or may not result in an on-site inspection from OSHA. Category 2 cases are at the discretion of the Area Director as to whether or not an on-site inspection occurs.
Category 3:
If a report does not meet the criteria for Category 2, then it is classified “Category 3” and OSHA will open an RRI which usually involves employers conducting incident investigations and root cause analyses and submitting them to the agency.
An RRI is much more involved than the traditional “phone and fax” inquiry. Under an RRI, OSHA will send a letter requesting that the employer conduct its own investigation of the incident and report its findings, with supporting documentation.
Temptation to mislead OSHA
Some employers have been under the misguided assumption that a vague or misleading RRI might go unseen by OSHA. Quite the opposite it true, however. “Employers do themselves a great disservice when they submit a lackluster RRI incident investigation (to OSHA),” said Briggs. “OSHA has done, and will continue to do, investigations for incidents that OSHA previously said it would not do, based on (misleading or incomplete) incident reports.”
Red flags that catch OSHA’s attention and may lead to immediate on-site inspections include:
- Placing blame on the worker (e.g., “violated company policy,” etc.). Instead, stick to the facts and endeavor to ascertain what preceded each decision and act, gathering contributing causes along the way to a root cause for the incident.
- No indication of addressing the hazard(s). If a problem or issue is noted, resolve the issue immediately and report accordingly, without using the word “correct.” For example, use words such as “enhance” or “improve best practices…”
- Not being truthful. Wait until the facts are gathered instead of guessing. If the facts aren’t available by the time the initial call is made to OSHA, say, “We are conducting an investigation into the incident; we don’t have the facts yet, but we will call back when we do…” When the RRI is conducted, stick to the facts and avoid placing blame.