Accident Investigations

The Company provide a service to investigate accidents at work.

An accident is an unplanned and uncontrolled event which has led to, or could have caused injury to persons, damage to plant or other loss to the Company.

The cost of accidents can be considered to the employer:

• Cost of time to injured employee

• Cost of lost time to other employees in respect to

  • to assist an injured employee
    

  • out of curiosity
  
  
  • out of sympathy

• Cost of lost time to the Management Team and other Directors in respect to:
  • assisting an injured employee
  
  
  • investigating the cause of accident
  
  
  • arranging for the injured employee's work to be continued by someone else
  
  
  • preparing accident reports, which can lead to hearings, inquests and court attendances


• Cost due to damage to machines, tools, property and other plant and equipment


• Cost to the employer in continuing the wages of the injured person in full until the employee is fully recovered.

The importance of a robust health and safety system is paramount and that the documentation provided is adhered to, kept up to date, monitored and reviewed/altered when there are changes within the business.

Investigation of Accidents

The reasons for investigating accidents are the same as for accident prevention i.e. human, economic and legal. The findings are applied to prevent reoccurrence and to help formulate organisation, supervision and training programme.

The scope of investigations vary in accordance to circumstances, but the following are included :

• Chain of events leading to the accident.
• The cause or causes of the accident, leading to injury.
• Recommendations to prevent a re-occurrence.

Other considerations to be taken into account:


• Breach of statutory requirements or company regulations.
• Other hazards or weaknesses in procedure which, not contributing to the accident itself, that may have been revealed during the investigation.

All investigations of this nature never seek to blame any individual or groups of individuals. The idea is just to get facts, to stop a re-occurrence.

Please do not hesitate to contact us