Ray, did you hear about Jim’s accident in the warehouse this morning?
I heard a little bit. How is he?
He’s in the hospital. I haven’t heard anything more.
That’s not good. I’ll call his wife and see if there’s anything we can do.
Okay sounds good.
Look, I have a few questions about the investigation I’d like to go over, if you have a minute?
Sure. Let’s go to my office.
So, what exactly happened?
Well, at this point, we’re not entirely sure, but he took a pretty heavy fall on some oil.
Okay and what have you done so far?
Well, first we roped off the area, then we cleaned up the oil spill.
Good, so you corrected the immediate issue.
Yeah, but my question is: What do I do now?
Well, since Jim had to go to the hospital, we need to complete a Preliminary Investigation Report, and we need to do it within 48 hours.
Then we need to complete an Interim Corrective Action Report.
That’ll show what steps we took in the short term to make the area or job safe.
Okay, but what exactly do I put in these reports?
Let’s go to the WorkSafeBC website. They have a report template that makes it all pretty easy.
Here it is. There’s a guide on how to fill it out.
Most of the information is pretty basic: date of the incident, name of the injured worker, a description of what happened, and so on.
If you fill out the form, you’ll have addressed all the requirements of the investigation.
For the Interim Corrective Action Report, you just have to document what you’ve already done or will do while the full investigation is in progress.
Okay – that’s it?
Not quite.
That deals with the immediate issues, but to finish the investigation report, we need to figure out exactly how and why the oil ended up on the walkway.
Okay, well I’ve done some work on this.
Rich from the joint health and safety committee and I checked it out.
Turns out the oil came from an old compressor, and it may have been leaking for quite a while.
I’ve asked maintenance to take it out of service and look at it.
And we’re going to examine our maintenance program as part of a more permanent solution.
Great – you might find other issues as part of the investigation. We need to make sure this never happens again.
It all sounds pretty straightforward and normally I would wrap it up in a couple of days, but the problem is we’re doing inventory and I’m really busy.
As long as you finish the preliminary investigation within 48 hours, we’re good.
Then start the full investigation as soon as possible and have it completed in 30 days.
Right – and the Full Corrective Action Report just needs to be completed as soon as possible after that.
Exactly! And if it turns out the incident is more complicated and we need more time, we can contact a WorkSafeBC officer and ask for an extension.
Good to know.
So I send all the reports to WorkSafeBC?
No, we always send them the Full Investigation Report, but the other reports – like the preliminary report – only need to be sent if they ask for them.
And copies of all the reports need to be sent to our joint health and safety committee.
So that’s it?
That’s it.
Give me an update tomorrow on how you’re doing and I’ll get you an update on Jim’s condition.
All right, sounds good.
The joint health and safety committee must participate in any investigation and receive copies of all four reports.
The Preliminary Investigation Report must be completed within 48 hours.
The Full Investigation Report must be completed within 30 days and sent to WorkSafeBC.
The Interim Corrective Action Report must be completed as soon as possible after the preliminary investigation.
The Full Corrective Action Report must be completed as soon as possible after the full investigation.
To view the Employer Incident Investigation Report form or the Guide to Completing an Employer Incident Investigation Report, go to worksafebc.com.