SAFETY SOLUTIONS: OSHA Increases Their Penalties Towards Employers

Do you have unsafe machines on your site? It is 2016 and I cannot walk into any factory or place of employment where they have a maintenance facility or manufacturing machines and not find a bunch of unsafe machines and employers are making the employees run these machines. Does the management truly care about their employees and their families? I would have to say I do not think so. Recently, I terminated my services with an employer for this reason alone. The employer stated to me that it was cheaper to take the OSHA’s citation and argue it then to guard the machine. The cost for me to guard his machine would have been $350.00. This employer worked in the plastics industry.

I have been writing for this magazine for a number of years offering help in answering your questions on safety or machine guarding or offering a substantial discount of our services for conducting surveys for our readers. To date very few have utilized my services.

OSHA has stepped up their efforts to increase inspections for unguarded machinery. OSHA produces an annual list of the “Top 10 Most Frequently Cited Standards” and year after year, machine guarding holds onto the number 10 spot. The phrase machine guarding is an umbrella term used to encompass all safe operating practices as well as maintenance procedures involved with industrial machinery. Machine guarding is an issue that affects a wide variety of workplaces and with some 18,000 injuries and over 800 deaths occurring annually, no wonder it’s on OSHA’s radar. Many industrial machines have roughly the same basic components, but their safeguarding needs widely differ depending on the physical characteristics and operator involvement. This leaves a lot of room for things to fall through the cracks and get missed. To cover such a wide variety of machinery, subpart O of OSHA’s 1910 Safety Regulations covers everything from table saws to multi-ton metal presses.

On June 30, 2016, the U.S. Department of Labor announced the implementation of two interim final rules that will increase penalties under various federal statutes, including the Occupational Safety and Health Act (“OSHA”).

The interim rules were passed in compliance with the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act, enacted by Congress in 2015. The 2015 law directed agencies, such as OSHA, to adjust their penalties for inflation each year using a much more straightforward method than previously available. The law also required agencies to publish “catch up” rules this summer to make up for lost time since the last adjustments. Agencies were directed to publish interim final rules by July 1, 2016.

The stated purpose of the penalty increase is to maintain the deterrent effect of such penalties. “Civil penalties should be a credible deterrent that influences behavior far and wide,” said U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas E. Perez of the upcoming increases. “Adjusting our penalties to keep pace with the cost of living can lead to significant benefits for workers and can level the playing field [for] responsible employers who should not have to compete with those who don’t follow the law.”

OSHA prescribes minimum and maximum monetary penalties for certain types of offenses. “Serious” violations occur when an employer knows or should know about a violative condition, policy or practice that is substantially likely to cause death or serious injury in the event of an accident, while “Other-than-Serious” violations are violations of OSHA rules that usually would not cause death or serious injury but that are related nevertheless to job safety or employee health.

Under the interim rules, these maximum penalties will rise significantly - by 78%. These maximum penalties, which have not been increased since 1990, will increase as follows:

• The maximum penalty for “Serious” violations will rise from $7,000 to $12,471.
• The maximum penalty for “Other-than-Serious” violations, posting requirement violations, and failures to abate will also rise from $7,000 to $12,471.
• The maximum penalty for willful or repeated violations will rise from $ $70,000 to $124,709.
The new civil penalty amounts apply only to civil penalties assessed after Aug. 1, 2016, whose associated violations occurred after Nov. 2, 2015.

Certain industries, such as the construction industry, may be especially affected by the penalty increase. Out of 4,386 worker fatalities in private industry in calendar year 2014, 899 fatalities, or 20.5%, were in construction. More than half of worker deaths on construction sites were caused by the so-called “Fatal Four”: falls, electrocution, strikes by objects, and being caught in or between objects. See OSHA Commonly Used Statistics, available at www.osha.gov/oshstats/ commonstats.html. Therefore, employers can expect penalty amounts to be high for violations that cause or are likely to cause these types of injuries.

So if you have questions about safety or machine safety, please feel free to contact me.

Additional Resources

• Occupational Safety & Health Association – www.osha.gov
• National Institute for Occupational Safety & Health - www.cdc.gov/niosh
• Canadian Center for Occupational Health & Safety - www.ccohs.ca
• National Safety Council - www.nsc.org
• American Society of Safety Engineers - www.asse.org
• Podojil & Associates (www.podojilconsulting.com) also has free safety topics, training materials, monthly toolbox talks, safety checklists and PowerPoint programs that you can download free.

For more information, click on the author biography at the top of the page.