New Federal Rules on Workplace Injuries and Hospitalizations to be Adopted in Michigan

The federal Occupational Standards and Health Administration (OSHA) recently announced new requirements for reporting severe injuries and hospitalizations effective January 1, 2015.

States like Michigan operating their own OSHA program must promulgate standards which are at least as effective as the federal standards within six months of their publication in the Federal Register. The Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) has announced its intentions to adopt the new federal rules by reference.

The new Rule would require employers to report the following events to MIOSHA:

• All work-related fatalities within 8 hours;
• All work-related in-patient hospitalizations of one or more employees within 24 hours;
• All work-related amputations within 24 hours; and
• All work-related losses of an eye within 24 hours.

Currently, employers only have an obligation to report all work-related fatalities and work-related hospitalizations of three or more employees to OSHA/MIOSHA within 8 hours.

The new federal rule retains the current exemption for any employer with 10 or fewer workers from the requirement to maintain the 300 logs of worker injuries and illnesses. This brief tutorial explains how to complete the recordkeeping forms. The new rule also updates the list of employers partially exempt from the recordkeeping requirements. View a list of partially exempt industries here.

The revised recordkeeping rules will require 25 new industries to keep illness and injury records.

Please contact Wendy Block with any questions at wblock@michamber.com or (517) 371-2100. To learn more, mark your calendar for a 60-minute webinar on this topic on December 16, 2014. Email tsmith@michamber.com to be placed on a list to receive information about this webinar once available.