What makes OSHA stop and visit, and inspect, and question and fine????
Watching the video you will see first one person in the bucket, and then two, and you might think to yourself “Self, That seems dangerous to me!!!” They clearly are not working safely. There are a couple of questions that immediately come to mind for me. I’ll get into those later though, because this is exactly the type of thing that OSHA Inspectors either see on their own, or have sent to them on video just like this.
This type of video may cause an inspection based upon referral or complaint of unsafe working conditions or practices. Other reasons OSHA stops by to visit are:
- Previous citations recipient.
- Recent fatality or serious injury occurred at the workplace and was workplace related.
- An above average workplace injury and illness history for your industry.
- High hazard jobs receive more attention than clerical jobs.
This visual safety information causes them to stop at a farm, construction site, or manufacturing site, and conduct an unannounced inspection. Once they determine that there are indeed issues and problems on the work-site, they will go through their internal steps which result in a more formal planned inspection with the management team of the work-site.
OSHA fines are typically not budgeted into your Profit and Loss Statement; they completely come off the bottom line. They directly affect the profit margin of your operation. But what they are designed to do is focus your attention on workplace safety, and the health and welfare of the employees working for your organization.
One direct benefit of workplace safety programs is the reduction of possible citations in your workplace. Our focus is to identify hazards and shortfalls in a company’s safety program and environment, and then recommend or develop solutions to reduce those hazards and shortfalls.
