The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) wants to eliminate a reporting exemption available to automotive parts retailers and tire stores since 1982. If the agency goes forward, retailers would have to start filling out OSHA Forms 300 and 300A. The first is used to note when an employee is injured on the job and why. The second is a compilation of all injuries during the year. Form 300A is posted in the workplace. Service stations, on the other hand, who have had to fill out Forms 300 and 300A, would be newly exempt.
The Form 300 log had gotten OSHA into a bit of political trouble earlier this year when the Obama administration, bowing to anti-regulatory sentiment underlined by the 2010 election results, cancelled temporarily its intention to add a new column to Form 300 for musculoskeletal disorders (MSD).
For auto aftermarket retailers and other businesses in North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 4413, the OSHA estimates the total costs to the entire industry for filling out Forms 300/300A at $25,000 a year, an estimate the industry may well contest. Comments must be submitted by Sept. 20, 2011.
The reason for pulling the aftermarket exemption — and other industries are having their exemptions cancelled, too — has to do with the fact that when the exemption was established in 1982 the federal government used Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes to collect statistics. The aftermarket exemption was based on data from companies in its SIC code. If that SIC code had an average lost workday injury (LWDI) rate for 1978-80 at or below 75 percent of the overall private sector annual LWDI rate, that SIC code got an exemption. The SIC code for the aftermarket industry met that standard, was deemed "low hazard," and qualified for the exemption.
It continued to retain that exemption when OSHA revised the exemption list in 2001 based on 1996-1998 injury data. But in that year, the Department of Commerce shifted from a business classification system based on SIC codes to one based on NAICS codes. In many cases, a single SIC code was divided into several NAICS codes, and conversely, a single NAICS code might contain establishments from multiple SIC codes. Government statistical agencies such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), which keeps workplace injury data, slowly converted to NAICS codes over the next decade. Having completed that task, the OSHA decided to use these new NAICS codes to establish a new "low hazard" exemption list based on 2007-2009 BLS data.
Thus, specific industries, as defined by 4-digit NAICS codes, which had an average Days Away, Restricted, or Transferred (DART) rate for 2007-2009 of 1.5 or less, were awarded exemptions from the Form 300/300A requirement. Auto parts suppliers, tire stores and others in 4413 came in above 1.5.
The June 22 proposed rule from OSHA also included a second requirement having to do with reporting injuries to OSHA. The automotive aftermarket sector has not ever been exempt from this, nor has anyone else. Since 1971, OSHA has required all employers to report, within 48 hours after the occurrence, work-related incidents resulting in at least one fatality or the hospitalization of at least five employees. That includes aftermarket retailers. In 1994, the Agency revised its reporting requirements to require employers to report to OSHA, within eight hours, work-related events or exposures involving fatalities or the in-patient hospitalization of three or more employees. The requirements from the 1994 rulemaking have remained substantially unchanged since then. The proposed rule would change the 1994 requirement so that reports would have to be made when one, not three, employee accident resulted in death or hospitalization, and adds a second, new component requiring amputations to be reported within 24 hours.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) wants to eliminate a reporting exemption available to automotive parts retailers and tire stores since 1982. If the agency goes forward, retailers would have to start filling out OSHA Forms 300 and 300A. The first is used to note when an employee is injured on the job and why. The second is a compilation of all injuries during the year. Form 300A is posted in the workplace. Service stations, on the other hand, who have had to fill out Forms 300 and 300A, would be newly exempt.
The Form 300 log had gotten OSHA into a bit of political trouble earlier this year when the Obama administration, bowing to anti-regulatory sentiment underlined by the 2010 election results, cancelled temporarily its intention to add a new column to Form 300 for musculoskeletal disorders (MSD).
For auto aftermarket retailers and other businesses in North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 4413, the OSHA estimates the total costs to the entire industry for filling out Forms 300/300A at $25,000 a year, an estimate the industry may well contest. Comments must be submitted by Sept. 20, 2011.
The reason for pulling the aftermarket exemption — and other industries are having their exemptions cancelled, too — has to do with the fact that when the exemption was established in 1982 the federal government used Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) codes to collect statistics. The aftermarket exemption was based on data from companies in its SIC code. If that SIC code had an average lost workday injury (LWDI) rate for 1978-80 at or below 75 percent of the overall private sector annual LWDI rate, that SIC code got an exemption. The SIC code for the aftermarket industry met that standard, was deemed "low hazard," and qualified for the exemption.
It continued to retain that exemption when OSHA revised the exemption list in 2001 based on 1996-1998 injury data. But in that year, the Department of Commerce shifted from a business classification system based on SIC codes to one based on NAICS codes. In many cases, a single SIC code was divided into several NAICS codes, and conversely, a single NAICS code might contain establishments from multiple SIC codes. Government statistical agencies such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), which keeps workplace injury data, slowly converted to NAICS codes over the next decade. Having completed that task, the OSHA decided to use these new NAICS codes to establish a new "low hazard" exemption list based on 2007-2009 BLS data.
Thus, specific industries, as defined by 4-digit NAICS codes, which had an average Days Away, Restricted, or Transferred (DART) rate for 2007-2009 of 1.5 or less, were awarded exemptions from the Form 300/300A requirement. Auto parts suppliers, tire stores and others in 4413 came in above 1.5.
The June 22 proposed rule from OSHA also included a second requirement having to do with reporting injuries to OSHA. The automotive aftermarket sector has not ever been exempt from this, nor has anyone else. Since 1971, OSHA has required all employers to report, within 48 hours after the occurrence, work-related incidents resulting in at least one fatality or the hospitalization of at least five employees. That includes aftermarket retailers. In 1994, the Agency revised its reporting requirements to require employers to report to OSHA, within eight hours, work-related events or exposures involving fatalities or the in-patient hospitalization of three or more employees. The requirements from the 1994 rulemaking have remained substantially unchanged since then. The proposed rule would change the 1994 requirement so that reports would have to be made when one, not three, employee accident resulted in death or hospitalization, and adds a second, new component requiring amputations to be reported within 24 hours.
