There are lots of reasons for OSHA to come knocking at your door, but none are particularly pleasant.
The financially and manpower-strapped agency typically arranges its visits based upon a higher-than-normal incident rate, accident and/or death complaint, or perceived imminent danger, 10/12 Industry Report details in its latest edition,
Whatever the case, it’s important for a company to be prepared. This is especially true for the small to mid-sized company that might not have dedicated personnel to handle a safety program and its associated documentation.
Wayne Smith, regional safety manager for a major petrochemical plant in Lake Charles, says his safety personnel attend regional and national Voluntary Protection Program workshops to keep up to date on the latest regulations.
Staying on top of the latest iterations of OSHA policy, along with the voluminous amount of documentation, can be a daunting task. Fortunately, Smith and other safety professionals say, there are some steps an employer of any size can take to ensure an inspection goes smoothly, regardless of the circumstances.
The first step is to make sure that all paperwork is in order. Rightly or wrongly, if you give the impression that you’re unorganized, it’s fertile ground for the inspection to go deeper.
“You always need to be ready for an inspection,” Smith says. “All of your training records, injury logs and incident investigations—all that stuff needs to be organized and readily retrievable.”
Next, businesses should develop an auditing procedure. No matter the size of the organization, a company and/or plant should develop and fine tune its audit procedures and train all applicable personnel on the process.
On inspection day, be prepared for it to take as long as the entire day, or just a few hours.
