September 2014

Courtesy of the American Trucking Associations

On September 11, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) released a final rule entitled Occupational Injury and Illness Recording and Reporting Requirements – NAICS Update and Reporting Revisions. Under the final rule, OSHA expands work‐related injury and illness reporting, establishes definitions for in‐patient hospitalization and amputations, defines employer responsibility to report events, increases employers’ options for reporting events, and amends the list of industries that are partially exempt from requirements to keep records. The final rule goes into effect on January 1, 2015.

Under the current regulation, employers are required to report work‐related fatalities and in‐patient hospitalizations of three or more employees within eight hours of an event. The new regulation requires employers to report each fatality resulting from a work‐related incident within 8 hours of the death. This applies to all fatalities occurring within 30 days of a work‐related incident.

Additionally, employers must report each in‐patient hospitalization resulting from a work‐related incident, but the time to report was expanded from 8 hours to 24 hours. OSHA defines in‐patient hospitalization “as a formal admission to the in‐patient service of a hospital or clinic for care or treatment. Employers do not have to report in‐ patient hospitalizations that involve only observation and/or diagnostic testing.”

Finally, each amputation or loss of eye must now be reported within 24 hours of the amputation or loss of eye resulting from a work‐related incident. OSHA defined amputations to “include a part, such as a limb or appendage that has been severed, cut off, amputated (either completely or partially); fingertip amputations with or without bone loss; medical amputations resulting from irreparable damage; amputations of body parts that have since been reattached. Amputations do not include avulsions, enucleations, deglovings, scalpings, severed ears, or broken or chipped teeth.”

Under the final rule, as under the current regulation, employers are not required to report events resulting from motor vehicle accidents that occur on a public street or highway directly to OSHA. However, employers are required to report all fatalities, in‐patient hospitalizations, amputations, or loss of eyes that occur within a construction work zone on a public street or highway, other roadways, or off‐road. This exception does not eliminate an employer’s requirement to record the event on an employer’s OSHA injury and illness records. Additionally, employers are required to report any work‐related fatality or in‐patient hospitalization caused by a heart attack. OSHA states that an “employer’s local OSHA Area Office Director will decide whether to investigate the event, depending on the circumstances of the heart attack.”

In the final rule, OSHA states that the clock to report a fatality, in‐patient hospitalization, amputation, or loss of eye to OSHA starts when an event is reported to the employer or to any of the employer’s agent(s). Also, if an employer does not learn right away that the reportable fatality, in‐patient hospitalization, amputation, or loss of an eye was the result of a work‐related incident, the employer’s clock starts after the employer or any agent learns that the reportable event was the result of a work‐related incident.

Employers will have three options for reporting a fatality, in‐patient hospitalization, amputation, or loss of and eye:

(1) by telephone or in person to the OSHA Area Office that is nearest to the site of the incident; (2) by telephone to the OSHA toll‐free central telephone number, 1‐800‐321‐OSHA; or (3) by electronic submission using the fatality/injury/illness reporting application located on OSHA’s public website at www.osha.gov.

Finally, OSHA took this opportunity to update Appendix A of Subpart B of the Injury and Illness Recording and Reporting regulation. The updated appendix is based on more recent injury and illness data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (2007, 2008, and 2009) and lists industry groups classified by the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) instead of the current appendix list classified by the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC).

For more information please contact Abigail Potter at apotter@trucking.org.