Accidents Guidance

INTRODUCTION

An accident may be defined as an unplanned and uncontrolled event which may or may not result in personal injury, damage to equipment or environment. Accidents where no personal injury or damage occurs are usually referred to as "near miss" incidents.

THE ACCIDENT BOOK

All employers should keep an Accident Book to record details of accidents to employees at work, regardless of how minor those injuries may appear to be. It should be kept under the control of a responsible person, such as a first aider (see First Aid Guidance), and should be readily accessible to all employees, and made available to inspecting officers.

The information recorded in the Accident Book should be as detailed as possible and the book should be retained for a period of three years from the date of the last entry.

Arrangements should be made for a senior manager to review the Accident Book entries to ensure that suitable action has been taken following an accident to prevent a similar accident recurring.

Detailed Accident Records

Detailed accident records should be kept for three main reasons:

Employers will find it useful to use accident data to measure their health and safety performance. Accident data are an important part of the employer's risk assessments as they should identify types and causes of accidents, locations and times, etc. which will help to decide control measures.
There is a legal requirement to record information additional to that which can be recorded in the Accident Book:
- Accidents suffered by non-employees, for example customers or other visitors
- Particulars of reportable diseases suffered by employees
- The date on and method by which incidents were reported to the Enforcing Authority
Particularly in cases of work-related ill-health, liability claims can be made many years after the initial event.

ACCIDENT INVESTIGATION

All incidents, accidents and near misses should be investigated so that appropriate action can be taken to prevent a recurrence.

The Supervisor/Manager should commence an accident investigation and the progress and findings should be forwarded to a Senior Manager. This should be carried out immediately in the case of a serious accident.

In completing the Accident investigation the details requested on the form should be completed and consideration given to the following factors:

What any injured person was doing at the time of and immediately before the accident. Consider if they were authorised to be in that area; to do this type of work; had they been trained; were they supervised?
Details of plant, equipment, substances involved in the accident. Examine the equipment to the best of your ability. Where necessary, engage competent help e.g. engineer. Bear in mind that it may be best to engage an independent engineer if the integrity of the machine or maintenance standards may be questioned.
Other details such as weather, clothing, lighting etc. if relevant.
Nature of the injury and location on the body.
Take statements from any witnesses separately concerning what they saw at the time of the accident. Remain impartial and do not ask leading questions. Confirm that witnesses actually saw the incident and are not giving an opinion as to what they thought might have happened.
Record the conclusions. Stick to the facts and do not make subjective judgements. Opinions are peripheral to the investigation.
List recommendations for the prevention of a similar recurrence. Within the list of recommendations for accident prevention include any training requirements, including refresher training, which may be beneficial.

NOTE
If a serious incident has occurred and the Enforcing Authority need to be notified, do not allow anything to be interfered with until the Enforcing Authority has been consulted.