Posted By Sam Talbot The scenario: On Thursday, an employee is sent to carry out a job which they would not usually do (the job requires much more lifting than their normal one), however they do not report any accident/incident/strains etc. On Friday the employee attends work as normal and completes a full shift carrying out their normal job, again with no mention of any problems. Saturday & Sunday no work. Monday the employee claims to be suffering from tendonitis of the wrist, caused by the previous Thursday’s work. I foresee an employers’ liability claim in the offing, and wonder how much extra weight would be added to the claim if we reported (admission of liability). Would esteemed colleagues consider this to be RIDDOR reportable or not? Regards, Sam.

Posted By Sam Talbot The employee stated that they had seen their doctor, however we have not had sight of a sick note, and the intention was to re-commence work this afternoon, so the absence would be covered by self certification! As for what they got up to at the weekend.............

Posted By Heather Aston I totally agree with what people have said above about thorough documentation & investigation. I'm not a medical expert (I'm sure one will be along soon) but I thought tendonitis was a repetitive injury - not something caused by heavy lifting. This sounds more like a sprain to me - potentially important as tendonitis (if diagnosed by a medical practitioner in writing) is a RIDDOR reportable disease and a sprain is not. If I were in your position, I would not report this one. BTW I wouldn't worry about a 2508 being seen as an admission of liability. If you do have to report something about which you have doubt, use of the word "allegedly" in the right place makes it quite clear to HSE (and subsequently the insurers/solicitors and courts) that you doubted the employee's side of the story and were merely erring on the side of caution. Heather

Posted By Neil Pearson I must disagree with Heather here. If you have to say "alleged" then you don't know the cause of the problem yet, and you can't say it's work-related, so don't report it. If it does turn out to be reportable (depending on what the occ health people say) then you know that it was caused by work, and avoiding liability is just a matter of saying no more than you need to. That's my understanding anyway.

Posted By Graham Findlay I would tend to agree with Heather. This condition is something that only a medical professional would be able to diagnose, and it wouldn't manifest itself in such a short space of time! As the alleged injury didn't result in 'over 3 days lost time' either, then the matter isn't reportable under RIDDOR. Even it was reported, doing so would not be an admission of blame, but merely complying with the regulations. Under civil law, it would be down to the 'injured' party to prove that injury was a direct result of a breach of duty of care. I would ask the person to report the 'incident, and if necessary, refer them to the company's Occupational Health advisors. The person will soon make excuses NOT to attend if the condition isn't genuine! Regards Graham

Posted By fats van den raad No time off, no reportable injury or disease, no RIDDOR

Posted By fats van den raad Yeah Allan, they sure do. The "I'll better report it just for incase" brigade must be responsble for thousands of reports anually that should never have been reported. As for me, if a situation develop where it not clear cut whether to report or not I ask the question " Would I be able to justify logically and honestly why I didn't report?" If the answer is yes, I don't report. If no or still doubt, I report.

Posted By J Knight Surprised by some of the answers in this thread. Tendonitis is not solely caused by repetitive work. It can be caused by a single traumatic event. How do I know? A single trauma is how I got a form of tendonitis back in the 1980s. the point is, it is not up to us to make judgments about the accuracy or otherwise of a diagnosis. We are not doctors, and occy health might help, they might not. What we do with RIDDOR is make a judgment about whether a reported incident resulted in an absence of three days or more (thanks for the sense Fats); it doesn't matter how long after the event we get the report, it doesn't really matter whether we consider that a fast one is being pulled. If there is a good likelihood that an incident has resulted in a reportable condition or event then we should report. It is not an admission of liability. To say that such and such an incident occured and had such and such an outcome is to say nothing about why the incident occured, which is where any liability or duty of care rests. The underlying cause of the accident, and questions of guilt or culpability should be tackled in our report. If there is an investigation by the enforcers following the incident they will draw their own conclusions about guilt or otherwise, the report will be only a bare starting point for their investigation; and they probably won't visit for an over-three day. Enforcers are often asked for a copy of a RIDDOR report at the start of a claim if a claimant's solicitor considers the accident reportable; if there is no report on file it is at this point that they will start to ask awkward questions, and it at this point that the possible penalties for not reporting start to loom large. The case in question, as reported, is not reportable, but please don't let paranoia get in the way of a simple duty, John

Posted By J Knight Heather, Three days not including the day of the injury; technically that's four days, but the first day will only be part of a day... John

Posted By Tony Gibbs Which all goes back to the "risk assessment" for the job the employee does not usually do. Tony

Posted By J Knight Heather, fair enough, I do think of it as three, but it is on the fourth dya that the report goes in, John