Blimey! I hope "they" followed procedure and there is more to this than meets the eye.

Speaking from long experience of SHE management, I would advise that you should NEVER report anything which is a statutory report (eg RIDDOR, IPC etc) unless you are CERTAIN it is reportable. Reporting RIDDORs for instances may have long term repercussions on the organisation - think benchmarking, performance measurement, tendering etc.

Even if somebody is off work [in an average situation] that should not stop somebody from investigating the event e.g. go to their home

I can't agree with Canopener here - you don't get out of RIDDOR reporting by terminating the injured person's employment! For all we know the person could still not be fit for work. I have no answer to Lisa's problem only sympathy and a little horror at this tricky predicament.

Kate, I understand your view however I don't think that the employer has dismissed the individual for the specific purpose of avoiding making a RIDDOR report, although that may nevertheless be a consequence. In saying that I have reconsidered my arithmetic! Assuming that the individual reported 'sick' (I assume this was as the result of the accident - if not there would be no need to report) on the 21st and was dismissed on the 28th, then by my revised reckoning that could well make it over 7 days days (not including the day of the accident) and that makes the injury reportable. If on the other hand they reported 'sick' on the 22nd or later and/or were dismissed on the 27th or earlier, then I don't think it would be reportable. The key issue for me is whether the IP was an employee at the point that the over 7 days criteria is realised. It may not seem right and in fairness my take on it may be totally wrong, but I would have thought that technically if an employee leaves your employment (for whatever reason) I would say that the duty to report no longer exists if the trigger point occurs outside of their employment; but I'm happy to hear others thoughts. As an aside, there is obviously more going on here than meets the eye.

In support of Canopener I would add that too often injured personnel complain that their employer didn't care enough to enquire as to their health or recovery. I have also heard people say that if the employer had been more caring that may not have made a claim.

Yes but we are talking here about visiting someone who has just been sacked after being off work for 7 days. What do you think that person's frame of mind is going to be especially if you turn up uninvited?

To be fair, Bob said "in an average situation". Visiting or 'phoning someone who is off - through illness or accident - demonstrate the employer cares and is taking the situation seriously. Waiting until someone comes back is hardly showing you care about what has happened, and that you want to make sure any mistakes or weaknesses are rectified as soon as possible. Ian

More than "plenty of average " situations involving dismissal. I have no issue with inquiries following accidents providing protocols and common decency are maintained. Common decency does not extend to turning up unannounced in my book. Jon

Ok for this situation I would still contact the IP and ask if it was ok for me to visit or ask questions over the phone. I would try and explain my only goal was to prevent anyone else getting injured in the same way. If they say no ( or words to that effect) I would record that the IP refused to give a statement in my investigation. But I would give the person the option to co operate. I do not see it hurts to try, they can only say no. Even if they did agree I would note they may be a hostile witness. But I could also assess if they were still suffering from their injury that they still could not resume their full duties (as best I could). With regard to RIDDOR - I would ask myself if the injury sustained would in all probability / realistically lead to the employee not being able to do their full range of duties after the 7 days. This would be the same as if the over 7 days fell on a weekend, where you are to assess the persons ability to work. Chris

Canopener Seems to me that what matters in terms of RIDDOR reportability was the injured person's employment status on the day of the accident, rather than when the IP was been disabled from their normal work for more than 7 days.

At the moment I don't think that it has been suggested that the employee is raising a grievenace (although he/she may feel aggrieved). It looks to me that there is a lot more going on here and that the employee may not have a case for a grievance i.e. procedurally the employer may have 'legally' dismissed. We don't know. While the person may well lodge a PI claim, I am struggling to see how not having made a RIDDOR report would strike out any defence. Could you explain how it might? While there may be an investigation by the HSE and that may incur FFI, it is unlikley to result in a £50k fine. However, I have to concede that the comments at #21/22 are equally, if not more plausible and I also accept the point made by Chris at #20.

My professional view is that if there is a need to call employees home for work-related accidents/illnesses, it should be explicitly covered by the sickness absence policy first and foremost. As we are not privy to the details regarding the posters case, to speculate regarding RIDDOR /Civil action related enforcement action,fines & FFI etc is pre-mature. Regarding RIDDOR:- Regulation 16 on "Defence" is:- "In proceedings against any person for failing to comply with a requirement of these Regulations, it is a defence for that person to prove that they were not aware of the circumstances which gave rise to that requirement, so long as that person had taken all reasonable steps to be made aware, in sufficient time, of such circumstances" Therefore one has to take all reasonable steps to be made aware, in sufficient time, of such circumstances and it appears that if an employee is not co-operating by even not informing as per sickness absence policy, the employee is unlikely to be "forced" to do so. Based on the limited information given, the gap appears to be the lack of co-ordination between the person who took the decision to sack the employee and the alleged linkage of the absence/sickness to a work related accident and its investigation process. I am aware of several absence/sickness reporting formats that have no prompts/questions related to work-related accidents/illnesses . This is critical when there is a peripatetic workforce or the workforce is spread over several locations and there is a centralised sickness/absence reporting system.

Lisar, I think the matter should still be investigated and if this leads you to find the injury would have prevented the IP from carrying out their duties for over 7 days then yes it should still be reported as a RIDDOR. I am left wondering why the company didn't call the employee to make sure they were ok when they didn't call in? I have called employees at various times while they were signed off and they have always been glad to talk. Obviously though, use wisdom. I am also really glad that I don't work for a company that will sack a person while they are still on sick leave, unless of course the employee gave someone a thump or something serious, in which case they should have been sacked for that and not for simply not reporting in every day. This actually raises an OT question: Is it reasonable to make an employee call in every day if the nature of their injury would mean they would certainly not be able to perform their duties for a length of time? This is not the first time I have encountered the policy and as others have suggested, it shows more caring if the employer initiates the contact.

Hi all, Well, this is a coincidence. I have a similar dilemma and just happened to find this post. An employee suffered an injury at work on the 24th February. He attended hospital with a supposed injury to his wrist. No medical report was provided at the time. The employee was on his 2nd week of employment and decided to use a piece of work equipment he wasn't trained to use or instructed/asked to use. This happened while his Supervisor was with another employee. The employee hasn't followed HR absence procedure which requires daily contact with his line manager for the first 7 days, he didn't make contact until the 10 day of absence claiming his phone was broken and had no access to other phones. During his call he confirmed he had a 'fit note' which covered him for 7 days and told us he would be back on the 7th March. However, he didn't show up for work on the 7th and instead contacted HR again to inform us he had misread his Fit Note, it was for 14 days not 7! Quite rightly, our HR department ask him yet again to forward a copy of this Fit Note to which he agreed and also confirmed he would be returning to work today (17th March). Today, he has again failed to return to work. I haven't been able to contact him. Given the circumstances that lead to his accident (his failure to follow HR requests, not keeping in touch with HR, using equipment he hadn't been trained to use or ask to use) HR and the Production Department will be dismissing him. Before dismissal I had intended to sit him down and get a formal statement. As yet, we still don't have any evidence that his injury was severe enough to cause his lengthy absence. So, given the lack of information I am not prepared to reprot it to the HSE. What do you guys think?

I have been informed today that an incident in which an employee was injured (he did not report to the office at the end of the day, did not call etc until he had driven to the hospital, then driven home), has just attracted a FFI invoice of £682. The competent person was initially informed that the IP would be sick for 2 weeks, so sent a Riddor. The IP was sick less than 5 days, so not long enough to Riddor, but the Riddor generated a HSE visit, and subsequent FFI. Company breach under MHSW reg 5 as no risk assessment for what IP was allegedly doing, namely trying to move a pallet with 1000kg on by hand as his pallet truck had broken. Despite having had MH training, in which they are told only to move pallets with pallet truck or FLT, etc, HSE said there should be an RA and SWP for moving heavy pallets by hand ! Company did not have RA for this as they did not think anyone would actually try it ! So report Riddors, but ensure you really are sure first, as an earlier poster said, it could attract a visit, and you may be surprised at what they find .

Paul Rs Did the IP report the incident/injury before he left work to go to the hospital? Was it entered in the Accident Book? Could be fertile ground for you to invoke your Accident and Near Miss policy and also possible disciplinary action. Yes, I would appeal the FFI. Sadly , some (including very many safety bods) are of the opinion that Risk Assessments are required for each and every task at the workplace. Jon