E-reporting change: OSHA to require sites with 100+ workers in certain industries to e-submit Forms 300, 301, and 300A data

OSHA will publish a proposal this week that will change the landscape of electronic submission of injury and illness records, by requiring certain employers to submit data from ALL of their injury and illness logs. This is a change from the current requirement, which only requires selected employers to submit information from their annual injury and illness summaries.

Under the proposal, OSHA plans to require sites with 100+ workers in certain industries to electronically submit information from Forms 300, 301 and 300A annually. The industry list is based on a combination of industries that had a three-year incident rate of 3.5 and the prior list of high-hazard industries that covered smaller employers (20-249 employees), requiring the latter to submit information from their annual summaries (Form 300A).

In making this change to an industry-based approach, the agency is dropping the requirement for all sites with 250+ workers in all industries to submit their Form 300A information.

Additionally, sites with 20-249 workers in specific high-hazard industries will continue to only submit their Form 300A summary information. Note: OSHA is, however, changing the industry list to reflect 2020 NAICS codes.

In an effort to preserve worker privacy, OSHA will not collect employee names from the Form 300, nor will they collect similar information from the Form 301 or information on the physician and location of treatment.

To summarize, if the proposal becomes final:

• Employers with 100+ workers in certain industries will have to submit information from their Forms 300, 301, and 300A;
• Employers with 20-249 workers in certain industries will continue to submit information from their Form 300A only; and
• Employers with 250+ workers not in a listed industry will no longer have to submit their Form 300A summary.

What to expect

As this is a proposal, there will be a comment period. OSHA will analyze and respond to those comments when issuing a final rule. So, it will take some time for this to take effect, and the list of industries or size criteria could change based on comments received.