Changes to Washington State Safety Laws Could Affect Companies Employing Temporary Workers Nationwide
New law applies to employers engaged in construction, contracting, or subcontracting to build highways, utility projects, or facilities that use power-driven machines/equipment
Did you know that a single state’s safety law can be used by federal OSHA to cite you, even if you don’t operate in that state? That’s what makes news like this important.
Oftentimes, temp agencies will have minimal comprehensive training, and most of the time the rock bottom cheapest safety gear for these workers. Good contractors can fit them in to their safety program if they are good workers and are going to be on the job a while. However, temporary employees are more likely to be injured and more likely to file lawsuits against their employers or staffing agencies, partly because they are often ineligible for workman’s compensation. And that’s not to mention OSHA, who frequently cites employers for situations that temps create, or are exposed to.
Under Article 5A, OSHA can use a law in place anywhere in the United States to issue a citation, even one operating outside the jurisdiction of that law’s passage. This is a modern industry standard that you should be aware of.
Your safety professional, whether on site on contracted, should be prepared to avoid any citations that may come your way. A knowledge of industry rules across the nation is imperative.
At Preferred Safety, we understand how to keep you safe and compliant. We can design questionnaires, tests, or trainings to save you tens of thousands of dollars in fines–or worse, injuries, lawsuits, and fatalities. Shop our safety products, connect with us, or read the bill in its entirety below.
Good to know. The same is true of any ‘new’ worker – giving them a basic orientation, and understanding of their role. their job, the LIMITS of what they can do, and what they can’t do, and who to contact if anything (!!) is told to them that’s different or something occurs which isn’t fully explained or for which they are trained for. IF they see or hear of any hazards, who is it they should report to? In addition to basic stuff like where to go for bathrooms, refreshments , cooling off, if injured or sick, or anything at all that you’d take for granted but which they do NOT have any idea about.
If they’ve been trained to do a type of job, its still the host employer’s job to be SURE they know what they are doing and are going to be doing it by the rules and the requirements of this jobsite.
I was on a jobsite where a new crane was rented and delivered, and a new operator was called for, to run it. That day, it was to be a critical 2 crane pick of a digester cover for a sewer plant, and the load was nearly 80,000 lbs.
The operator was getting familiar with his crane in the a.m. and i saw him, and asked him to boom out and down and to lower the load block. He managed to get outriggers to go in and out, and the boom to go in. I asked him to come down from the crane, and took him to the superindents office. while walking over, i asked if he had any crane experience, he said it was a long time ago. He had run a dozer and a grader for two decades, for ONE company that had recently closed. He was sent back, and the Supt. agreed that he should hire a fully insured and operated rental crane and have a rigging supt. come in from another nearby job, to engineer and run the critical lift.
That temporary crane and its designated operator could have been a really big operator. So, “temp” doesn’t always mean laborer, nor always mean simple and menial jobs. Every new worker, whether from an agency, or elsewhere should be considered for your jobsite training, orientation, mentorship, and evaluation before trusting that they will be a good fit, or know how to do what it is you need them to do.