Posted By Nick Patience The definition of "at work" for RIDDOR is the same as it is for HSWA. the info is in Section 52 of the Act. Decided cases like PRP Architects v Reid or Bolton Metropolitan Council v Malrod Insulation may also help. From the info you have given I think your employee was at work and therfore the incident is reportable.

Posted By Paul M69 I would agree with the two previous postings but only if the work equipment, in this case the bench, was faulty and actually caused the injury. Okay, the person was "in work" but not actually doing or involved in any work when the injury occurred. Did any aspect of the work cause the injury? If not then I would not report. My understanding of the two cases referenced above were that they were as a result of faulty equipment or deficient procedures. Regards, Paul.

Posted By mark pearson re above case i think that was an old one and the judge comented the member of staff was off on a frolic!

Posted By john thos 147 My view is that as it happened at work whether it be in the employee' s time or not then it is reportable. If a visitor was on site who you wasn,t paying had an accident you would be liable so there must be correlation between the two.

Posted By ITK Not a work activity. Not reportable. ITK.

Posted By ITK Ray is standing up from a bench really a work related injury. Methinks not. For example. IP walks down corridor and trips over own shoelace, not reportable. IP walks down corridor trips over cable from vacuum cleaner, reportable. (Subject to major injury, over 3day rule etc). ITK.

Posted By Del Leslie-Dell as far as i am aware the guideline is an unwanted unplanned event/occasion that caused harm at work. I Think this was a legal definition by a Lord Lindley was harm cause - yes was it unplanned/unwanted - yes was it at work - yes therefore a reportable LTA

Posted By ITK I dont believe if he was at work actually comes into it. The regs dont state "at work" they state "arising out of or in connection with work". ITK.

Posted By Liz Maw I agree with the last post - there was no accident as such so it is not reportable under RIDDOR. However when looking at the meaning of accidents arising out of or in connection with work this does have a very broad meaning.

Posted By DJ Sorry for the long post. In response to Fred's post in particular and the question generally, this is a complex area of law and each case will need to be decided on all the relevant facts. Reg. 3 of RIDDOR refers to "arising out of or in connection with work", which is relatively self-explanatory. Therefore if the accident was not while the person was "working" and there was no defect in the employer's workplace or work equipment that contributed to the injury then it will not have arisen out of or in connection with work. The s. 52 HSWA definition is more problematic, as "at work" throughout the time when he is "in the course of his employment". There is no statutory definition of in the course of his employment but there is a string of case law (some of which has already been mentioned in this thread). The difficulty arises because the injured party was on a break and so the question must arise about whether or not he was in the course of his employment e.g. if he was not being paid at the time, this would indicate that he was not at work, but there may be other factors that need to be taken into consideration. The term 'in the course of his employment' gives headaches to my employment law colleagues and so I don't think there is an easy answer. As I said at the beginning, each case will need to be decided on all the relevant facts. I hope this helps. DJ

Posted By Zorro Was he being paid at the time. We have a gym on our site staff are allowed to use it at lunch time or in unpaid time, a person injured off for 6 weeks it was not reportable due to the fact the the injury was not in connection with work and at the time he was not being paid. That is the information I was given twice by the HSE

Posted By martinw I know a lot has already been said, but take another look at: http://www.shponline.co....le_id=7812&viewcomment=1 which is the case when a court found that an employee retriving a ball from his employer's roof - on the employer's premises at all times and on a break having a kickabout - was deemed not to be at work despite being on the premises. More thoughts or am I just not helping?

Posted By ITK I agree with DJ. Not a work activity not reportable. ITK.

Posted By DJ Safetyamature you are perfectly entitled to disagree but that does not necessarily make your view the righ one. Why would you as a health and safety practitioner continue to investigate an incident if it is not a work-related accident. Would you investigate a case of stroke or a heart attack, or indeed somebody with the flue who came to work? DJ

Posted By safetyamateur Suggest we all look at RIDDOR guidance at para 45. Examples of people 'not at work' are given as in a hotel, carehome, student, customer in shop. Maybe another angle: let's say this chap was a visitor. And the investigation finds the ambulance took him to a hospital for a two-day stay? Fail to see how it becomes less reportable because he's a member of staff. Agree with most of your comment, Swis, but there's a danger that this cut & dried attitude to the reporting duty may be misleading.

Posted By safetyamateur Just read that back and the 'visitor' thing doesn't make sense. Needs to have the 'investigation' added to it. Which in the visitor's case may find a fault with the furniture. In the staff member's case it may find he'd just done a four hour stint in unacceptably cramped conditions which contributed to the 'back out' situation. AND he had an existing back injury. And so on, and so on. Pondering legal nuances won't help in this kind of situation, you need to spend that time on learning about the incident. Whatever, have a good wekend everybody.

Posted By Steve M Granger Safetyamateur etc, You may be wondering why the 'don't report' camp is so concerned about not classifying as a reportable. IMHO the issue of reporting under RIDDOR may not be a concern for some people but it is for those using KPI's etc. Unimportant to one may not be so for others. There is also the case of liability for the injury. Although not accepting responsibility, submitting a 2508 may assist the employee in turning a perfectly innocent and self inflicted injury into an industrial accident. This hardly seems fair when considering it may have occurred outside of the employers direct workplace control (ie the employee was on a frolic of his own) and consequently not 'at work', albeit occurring in the employers premises. Had there been a ‘fault’ with the bench which ‘caused’ the injury etc it’s a different story as it may have been provided as a duty under WPR. A visitor to the premises is under a different duty of care and consequently the reporting criteria are different and relate to simply being on the premises. Whilst the advice to 'report anyway' or 'check with the HSE' seems good it may also be prudent to observe that professional opinion is divided and therefore in some cases it may be worth the risk of not reporting in such circumstances (depending on the facts of the case which we do not have the luxury of). That, my friends, is a judgement call for a competent practitioner. Only a humble opinion but food for thought on why the waters are not clear…. Steve

Posted By Bill Parkinson Interesting comments and obviously a dilemma. However, as I work in a large acute trust we face this issue on an ongoing basis. The issue I would consider would be was this a "paid" break? If so then they are still at work and unless you invesigate the incident to determine what the basic causes were you cannot determine whether this was out of or in connection with work undertakings. You would be wise to investigate it anyway as there could be a litigation issue somewhere down the line and as you will need evidence to dispute any claim then failure to investigate it will probably mean you have to pay out.You also cannot be sure as to whether there was something which did occur from their working activities which was "triggered" by the action so the cause may not be as clear cut as thought. The issue as to whether you are a visitor or not does make a difference in terms of whether it is reportable under RIDDOR or not but this is not the case so no discussion. What is the problem in reporting it under RIDDOR requirements as you state on the F2508 that there where no identifiable circumstances as to contributary factors identified. You are not admitting any liability in reporting the incident under RIDDOR but could actually prevent any further issues arising. There may be a situation as to why this person has been off work for an extended period and this could be an underlying medical condition so if required could be referred to occupation health etc. (I had an incident where this occurred and the person involved was diagnosed with osteoporosis which they were not aware of. In similar cirucumstances in all my years as a practitioner I have not had any query raised by the HSE regarding reporting such incidents. Hope that helps. Bill CMIOSH

Posted By Steve M Granger Bill I don't think there is any debate on investigation, its more along the lines of should it be reported under RIDDOR. I am glad the 'yes' camp are still with us rather than busy filling in forms.... ... remember we still have a few days to decide!! Act with haste, repent with leisure.... Steve