Your duty as an employer is the health and safety of your team and your customers. Therefore, you must prioritise creating and sustaining a healthy and safe working environment.
How? With an all-singing-all-dancing incident reporting software of course!
Reliable incident reporting software is a key part of your health and safety management system. Rather than piled up paperwork, weeks of investigations via long email chains and missed critical evidence, opt for the safer option: a comprehensive tool to keep your end-to-end reporting accurate and centrally stored.
Why? By responding quickly and correctly to incidents and identifying and addressing hazards with confident incident management processes, you reduce the likelihood of incidents repeating and therefore reduce the risk of accidents and injuries and ill health in your workplace.
First things first, we’ll cover the basics:
What is an Incident?
In health and safety, there are specific terms for different dangerous occurrences in the workplace:
- Accident: An accident is an event that causes injury, harm or damage to a person or property.
- Incident: An incident is an event that does not cause injury, harm or damage to a person or property.
- Near Miss: A near miss is a type of incident – an event that could have caused injury, harm or damage to a person or property.
How do you report an Incident?
You must have a system in place for quick incident reporting, ideally with a ready-to-use form to fill in. This can be a traditional paper form, or it can be a digital incident reporting software. Whichever you choose to use, having a clear incident reporting process in place reinforces your commitment to building a safe workplace for your people.
When establishing your incident reporting documentation, it’s important to include as much detail on the incident as possible – including:
- Name
- Date
- Location
- What, how, why (if known)
- Any witness or supportive evidence such as videos or pictures.
You must report any RIDDOR reportable incident through the HSE website within 10 days of the incident, or within 15 days if it’s an illness resulting in 7 days of absence.
Is Incident Reporting Software a legal requirement?
According to UK law, it is your legal responsibility to report certain incidents, near-misses and accidents to HSE, under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR).
As the business owner or person in charge of the workplace, RIDDOR requires you to report:
- certain dangerous occurrences (incidents with the potential to cause harm)
- work-related accidents which cause deaths
- work-related accidents which cause certain serious injuries (reportable injuries)
- diagnosed cases of certain industrial diseases.
Having incident reporting software to record this information isn’t a legal requirement, you can handle all of these sensitive, important details pen-and-paper style if you prefer.
However, having incident management software in place allows you to record and store your reports in a safe, central location with clear, concise information to influence future safety practices and demonstrate that you are fulfilling your legal obligations effectively.
Why is Incident Reporting Software important?
More than 1.8 million people in Great Britain reported work-related illnesses in 2022/23. In fact, 561,000 employees reported sustained injuries, with 35.2 million working days lost due to work-related illness and workplace injury. Worst of all, there were 135 reported fatalities.
Besides it being your legal responsibility to report incidents, having incident reporting software is important because reporting incidents allows you to take the right corrective action, investigate root causes and prevent any future occurrences. This demonstrates your commitment to your people and reinforces your brand’s safety culture.
To take the right corrective action for the incident:
If you don’t accurately record the details of the incident, near miss or accident, you don’t necessarily choose the right corrective action to address it. Little bits of information are easily missed when you are rushing to find your paperwork and understand what has happened in the moment. However, when you use incident management software, you can quickly and easily find the correct digital form to use and even add supporting photographic evidence for 100% accurate documentation.
To investigate incident root causes:
In order to effectively manage incidents, you can’t just take corrective actions to address it in the moment, you must also identify and address the root causes. This involves a full investigation into how the incident was able to occur and why. Incident reporting software provides a space to do this with comments, sign off and end-to-end evidence trail built-in. Easy to keep track of and collaborate on – for simple conduction of root cause inquiries.
To prevent future incidents:
Your priority with incident management is to prevent incidents from occurring and maintain a safe working environment. So, once you’ve discovered the underlying cause of an incident, near miss or accident, you must put preventative measures into place so that it can never happen again.
5 advantages of Incident Reporting Software
1. It saves you time and hours of manual reporting
Better than paperwork or a spreadsheet, digitally reporting incidents within a software system removes the burden of manual work. Our incident reporting software is fitted with RIDDOR-style reports to remove the hassle of having to fill in different forms from different websites and software. Plus, these reports have drop-down options, pre-filled answers and are easier and quicker for you and your team to fill in.
2. It keeps you organised
Stay on top of things and avoid getting overwhelmed if incidents happen. Incident management software removes the need to keep numerous versions of physical Accident Log Books or various files in a fancy Google Drive folder. All reports are saved digitally in one place so you can’t lose any. Easy to access at any time, a quick look into your filterable incident report library is enough to let you assess and review a recurring incident or trend.
3. It gives you quicker approval and communication chains
Having all reports filled in and saved in an incident reporting software enables quicker approval and investigation processes. Less faxing, emailing, calling and posting between teams, it’s all done digitally in the platform. In addition, you can set up strict approval workflows and confidentiality settings to match your business needs. Finally, such software allows you to follow the entire reporting and investigation process digitally with in-platform messaging and reminder alerts.
4. It gives you in-depth reporting and a secure evidence trail
All evidence can be digitally uploaded with the report in a few seconds. Videos, images and files are added within a few clicks, saving you the hassle of printing, attaching and storing fiddly pieces of paper together. Safety incident report = flawless. Confidential? No problem, just set up your own settings.
5. It allows you to identify trends and find root causes
Our incident management software allows you to see the bigger picture. Are there any repeating patterns? Or maybe incidents keep happening at specific times of the day, at a particular site or with a certain type of product? Once again, this kind of software saves you time and effort, removing the burden of browsing piles of paperwork. Filters and automated reports do the job for you. In addition, incident reporting software supports you in finding root causes and taking corrective action. Maybe it’s time for your staff to do a refresher training on manual handling after the last 5 similar incidents?
So, why not make the change today and level up your safety game with incident reporting software for your business?
Download our Incident Reporting Software Solution Sheet to learn more:
If you need help with your safety processes, speak to a member of our safety team who will be able to advise you on how to operate safely.
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