Reporting hazards, near misses and injuries

Six weeks into the job, Jordan cut his hand. He was opening a carton of plant pots with a box cutter, the blade slipped on the tape, and it caught the side of his left palm. It was not deep, but it bled a lot. One of the cashiers, a trained first aider, cleaned and bandaged it in the staff room. Jordan felt silly, and his first thought was to go back to work and say nothing more about it. It was only a cut. He did not want to be the new guy who made a fuss.

Priya found out anyway, because the first aider filled in the first aid record, as Greenway's procedure says. She came to see Jordan and asked him to fill in an injury report with her. 'This is exactly the kind of thing I want to know about,' she said. 'You got lucky. The next person might get the blade in their wrist. And if that cut gets infected next week, you'll want a record that it happened here.'

This lesson covers why reporting matters, what to report, how to report it, and what should happen after you do.

Why reporting matters

Every report is information. A hazard report tells the workplace about something that could hurt someone. A near-miss report shows where an injury almost happened. An injury report shows where the controls failed. Without reports, the people who can fix problems do not know the problems exist.

Reports also protect you. If you are hurt at work, a report made at the time is the best evidence that the injury happened on the job. It supports a workers' compensation claim if you need medical care or time off later. Many injuries that seem minor at first, like a strained back, a cut that gets infected, or a knock to the head, turn out to be worse a day or a week later.

And reports help everyone else. When Priya looked at the box cutter injury, she found two other cuts from box cutters in the past year, both reported only in the first aid book. Together, they showed a pattern. Greenway switched to self-retracting safety knives in receiving and the store, which pull the blade back as soon as it leaves the material. In the year after the change, there were no more box cutter cuts.

What to report

The rule at Greenway is simple: if in doubt, report it. In general, you should report:

• Hazards: anything you notice that could hurt someone, like a broken step, a missing guard, a leaking container, a blocked exit, a faulty tool or an unsafe way of doing a job.
• Near misses: events where nobody was hurt but someone could have been, like a pallet that slid off the forks, a customer who stepped into the forklift lane, or a ladder that wobbled.
• Injuries and illnesses, however small, including those treated with first aid only. Also report symptoms that you think might be from work, such as a rash after handling a product, or pain that builds up over days of lifting.
• Damage to equipment, vehicles or property, even if no one was near it.
• Violence, threats and harassment, which Lesson 11 covers.
• Unsafe acts that put people at risk, such as a co-worker riding the forks, after speaking to the person directly if you can.

How to report

Every workplace should have a clear way to report. At Greenway, there are several ways, so nobody has an excuse not to:

• Tell your supervisor in person, as soon as you can. This is always the first step for anything urgent.
• Fill in the online form through the QR code posted in every work area, or on the staff tablet in the yard office.
• Use the paper forms in the staff room for anyone who prefers paper.
• Talk to a committee member if you are not comfortable going to your supervisor.

Whatever the method, a good report answers a few simple questions. The more specific it is, the easier it is to fix.

A report is not a confession, and it is not a complaint about a co-worker. It is information to fix a problem. Stick to the facts, describe what you saw, and say what you think would help. You do not need to know the cause for certain.

When to report

Report as soon as you can, ideally the same shift. Memories fade quickly. Conditions change: the spill gets mopped up, the broken pallet gets thrown out, the witness goes home. And a hazard that is not reported today might hurt someone tomorrow.

For anything that is an immediate danger, act first and report right after. Make the area safe if you can do it safely, for example by putting out cones, blocking off the area or switching off a machine, and get your supervisor straight away. Do not leave a hazard unattended while you go to fill in a form.

Reporting injuries: what the law requires

When a worker is injured at work in Saskatchewan, a few legal steps follow:

• The worker must tell the employer about the injury as soon as possible, even if no time off is needed. The worker can also file a Worker's Initial Report of Injury, called a W1, with the WCB, and the employer must give the worker the form if asked.
• The employer must send the WCB an Employer's Report of Injury, called an E1, within five days of learning about the injury, whether or not the worker misses time.
• Serious incidents, such as a death, an injury that needs a hospital stay, and certain dangerous occurrences like a structural collapse or a major chemical release, must also be reported to the OHS Division right away. The scene of a serious incident must not be disturbed, except to help the injured or prevent further harm, until an officer allows it.
• The employer must investigate serious incidents, usually with the occupational health committee, and keep records.

Jordan's cut needed only first aid, so it did not need an E1 to the WCB. It still went in Greenway's first aid record and on an internal injury report. If it had needed stitches from a doctor, or caused him to miss work, Greenway would have had to report it to the WCB within five days.

Employers must not discourage workers from reporting injuries. A rule that punishes workers for being hurt, or rewards teams for having no reported injuries, can lead people to hide injuries, which is both dangerous and against the spirit of the law.

What happens after you report

A report should never disappear into a drawer. At Greenway, every report gets the same treatment:

• Immediate action. The supervisor makes the area safe if that has not already been done.
• A look into it. For small things, the supervisor checks and fixes it. For injuries and serious near misses, the supervisor investigates with the worker and, for serious events, with a committee member. The goal is to find out why it happened, not who to blame.
• A fix. The supervisor decides what to change. Bigger fixes go to Tom or the committee.
• Feedback. The person who reported hears back about what was done, usually within a week. If nothing can be done right away, they are told why and what happens next.
• Review. The committee looks at all reports each month for patterns, like the three box cutter cuts.

Feedback is the part that most workplaces forget. If people report and never hear back, they stop reporting. When Priya told Jordan about the new safety knives, she made a point of saying his report was what started it. 'You'd be amazed how many reports we got after people heard that story,' she said.

Reporting symptoms that build up

Not every work injury has a moment you can point to. Some build up slowly: an ache in the wrist after weeks of potting plants, a cough that gets worse on days spent bagging soil, a rash that keeps coming back after watering with a certain fertilizer mix, ringing in the ears after shifts near the wood chipper. These are harder to report, because there is no single event, and people often assume they will go away.

Report them anyway, and report them early. Tell your supervisor what you notice, when it started and what you were doing. Early reports give the workplace a chance to change the task before the problem becomes permanent, and they create a record linking the symptoms to work if you need treatment later. Marisol reported wrist pain in her second spring at Greenway. The fix, a set of lighter potting tools and swapping tasks every hour, cost less than one week of a lost-time claim.

Why people do not report, and what helps

Even in good workplaces, many hazards and injuries go unreported. Knowing why helps you and your workplace do better. Common reasons include:

• Fear of blame or discipline, which is the most powerful reason. Workplaces that respond to reports by asking 'who did it?' get fewer reports.
• Not wanting to look weak or make a fuss, which is common among new and young workers, and in jobs where toughness is admired.
• Thinking it is too small to matter.
• Thinking nothing will be done, often because past reports were ignored.
• Not knowing how, or finding the process too slow or complicated.
• Pressure to keep injury numbers low, especially when bonuses or awards depend on them.

Greenway tackled these one at a time. Tom told every staff meeting that reports would never lead to blame for honest mistakes. The QR code made reporting take under a minute. Feedback became routine. And the safety award the yard team used to get for 'days without an injury' was replaced with one for the best idea that came from a report.