Unsafe situations and near misses, from reporting to improvement

/ Dutch / Door

Capturing reports of unsafe situations and near misses is an issue that many SHEQ managers and prevention advisors scratch their heads over. Often employees are not sufficiently involved, the reporting threshold is too high and they do not see any added value in making a report. However, a reporting culture has many benefits for an organization's safety policy.

What does the theory say?

In 1931, William Heinrich was the first safety expert to introduce the described relationship between accidents without injuries, accidents with minor injuries and accidents with serious injuries (including fatalities).
In his safety pyramid he stated that for every serious injury, there are 30 accidents with minor injuries and 300 accidents without injuries. Although the relationships between them have been frequently adjusted over the years, the foundation has remained unchanged.

What happens in practice?

Despite this theory, there are many organizations that currently record only accidents with minor or serious injuries. Therefore, unsafe situations and near misses do not have to be declared to the workplace accident insurance. However, in the codex well-being at work there are obligations for these so-called incidents as well:

  • The Internal Service for Prevention and Protection at Work must participate in the study of the factors influencing the occurrence of accidents or incidents (Art. II-1-4, 2°).
  • The prevention advisor must conduct investigations following occupational accidents and incidents that have occurred in the workplace (Art. II.1-6 §1, 1°-d).
  • Members of the hierarchy must investigate accidents and incidents that have occurred in the workplace and propose measures to prevent such accidents and incidents (Art. I.2-11, 2°).
SCC (VCA) 2017/6.0

More and more companies are required to meet the requirements of SCC 2017/6.0 in addition to legislative requirements. Chapter 11 of this checklist explicitly requires that all HSE incidents (from unsafe situation to lost-time accidents) must be reported, recorded and investigated.

Tips for creating a reporting culture

To improve reporting of unsafe situations and near misses, you first need to install a reporting culture. Some tips to achieve this in your organization:

Treat every report objectively and professionally. Often an unsafe situation or near miss is not reported because people are afraid that they will be blamed for the unsafe situation or near miss;

Engage employees in seeking possible solutions to a hazardous situation or near miss;

Communicate actions following a report to the workers involved. If workers see that a report is actually taken up, they will be more willing to report an unsafe situation or near miss again;

Make sure the notification method/procedure is well known within the organization, and that it is always consultable.

How can Phronesys help you?

Phronesys has a mobile application that allows any employee to quickly and easily report an unsafe situation or near accident. This has several advantages over a paper system:

  • Photos can be added directly to the notification via the mobile application;
  • The notification through the mobile application is immediately available in the cloud application;
  • There is no longer a need to scan and then digitize documents;
  • The use of incorrect versions or outdated forms is no longer possible;
  • ...
By simplifying the process, it will lower the threshold for employees to report more unsafe situations and near misses. This makes it possible for the organization to actually deal with safety instead of spending time and energy primarily on administrative concerns.

Would you like tailored advice for your organization to establish a reporting culture? Please feel free to contact us for personal advice.

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