RIDDOR: which incidents are reportable, and by when

RIDDOR — the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations — requires certain workplace incidents in the UK to be reported to the enforcing authority, and certain records to be kept. Most workplace injuries are not reportable; the point of the regulations is to identify the categories that are, and to make somebody responsible for recognising them quickly.

The responsible person is normally the employer, or the person in control of the premises. That is worth stating plainly because on a shared site, in a franchise, or with agency workers, the question of who reports is answered by the regulations rather than by whoever feels closest to the incident.

What RIDDOR makes reportable

• Deaths arising from a work activity.
• Specified injuries — a defined list including fractures other than to fingers, thumbs and toes, amputations, serious burns, loss of consciousness from head injury or asphyxia, and injuries from working in an enclosed space.
• Injuries to workers that make them unable to perform their normal duties for more than seven consecutive days.
• Injuries to members of the public taken directly from the scene to hospital for treatment.
• Certain occupational diseases where a doctor has made a written diagnosis linked to work.
• Dangerous occurrences — near misses from a defined list, such as collapse of lifting equipment or accidental release of a biological agent.
• Certain gas incidents, reported by different duty holders.

The seven-day rule causes most confusion. Over-seven-day incapacity is reportable, and separately, an over-three-day incapacity must be recorded even though it is not reportable. Two thresholds, two different obligations.

Deadlines that are short by design

1. Deaths and specified injuries: report without delay, by the fastest means, and follow with the report within ten days.
2. Over-seven-day injuries: report within fifteen days of the incident.
3. Occupational diseases: report as soon as the written diagnosis is received.
4. Dangerous occurrences: report without delay, with the report within ten days.
5. Keep the record regardless — records must be kept for reportable incidents and for over-three-day injuries.

Reporting is not an admission of fault, and it is not the same as an insurance claim or an internal investigation. Treating the report as something to decide after the investigation is how deadlines are missed — the report goes in on the facts known at the time and is not a conclusion about blame. The same record feeds the incident report and, where relevant, the osha 300 log equivalent in other jurisdictions.

The records behind the report

What makes reporting quick is not the form; it is having the facts already recorded: date and time, who was involved and in what capacity, what happened and where, what injury resulted, what was done immediately. An incident record made at the time answers the report, the investigation and, years later, a claim.

Retention matters more than it appears. Civil claims can arrive long after the event, and the file that answers one is the contemporaneous record, not a reconstruction. Set a retention period that reflects that reality rather than the minimum.

Ettex Records keeps incident records with their dates, attachments and the follow-up actions against them, so the question of whether an incident became reportable — often answered days later, when absence passes seven days — is checked against a record rather than a memory. Deciding reportability is a judgement for the responsible person, and the regulations are the authority; a records system only makes the facts available in time to make it.