A worker is hurt badly enough to go to the hospital. Your first job is to get them care. Your second job, and the one most employers get wrong, is to notify Cal/OSHA. Under Title 8, Section 342, every California employer must report a serious injury or illness, or a death, to the nearest Cal/OSHA district office immediately, and in no case later than eight hours after the employer knows or with diligent inquiry would have known about it. Missing that window is a violation in its own right, separate from whatever caused the injury, and it sets the tone for the inspection that will almost certainly follow.
What Counts as a Serious Injury or Illness
The definition changed in 2020, and many employers are still working from the old rule. Under current Labor Code Section 6302 and Section 342, a serious injury or illness is one that results in any of the following:
- Inpatient hospitalization for any reason other than medical observation or diagnostic testing
- Amputation
- Loss of an eye
- Any serious degree of permanent disfigurement
The old 24-hour hospitalization threshold is gone. If the hospital admits the employee as an inpatient for treatment, even if they are discharged the same day, that is reportable. The old exclusion for injuries caused by a Penal Code violation or a traffic accident on a public street is also gone. A delivery driver injured in a collision on the freeway is reportable if the injury meets the definition.
The injury does not have to happen on your property. It has to occur in connection with employment. A worker hurt at a customer’s site, a jobsite, or on the road while working is your report to make.
The Eight-Hour Clock
The clock starts when the employer knows, or with diligent inquiry would have known, that a serious injury occurred. Cal/OSHA does not accept the argument that the owner was on vacation and nobody told him. If a supervisor knew, the company knew. If a supervisor should have asked and did not, the company is charged with that knowledge.
Two practical consequences follow. First, every supervisor and lead needs to know that any injury involving an ambulance, an emergency room, or a hospital admission must be escalated immediately to whoever makes the report. Second, if you are not sure whether the employee was admitted, you make a diligent inquiry: call the hospital, call the family, call the employee. Do not wait for the answer to fall in your lap.
If you learn about a serious injury and cannot confirm the details within eight hours, report what you know. An incomplete timely report is far better than a complete late one.
How to Make the Report
Reports are made by telephone to the Cal/OSHA district office nearest the worksite, or through the online reporting form on the Cal/OSHA website. Email is not an accepted method. Fax is not an accepted method. Leaving a message with your workers’ compensation carrier is not a report to Cal/OSHA.
Section 342 lists the information you should have ready:
- Time and date of the incident
- Employer’s name, address, and telephone number
- Name and job title of the person reporting
- Address of the site where the incident occurred
- Name of the person to contact at the site
- Name and address of the injured employee
- Nature of the injury
- Location where the injured employee was taken
- List and identity of other law enforcement agencies present at the site
- Description of the incident and whether the scene has been altered
What to Say, and What Not to Say
The report is a factual notification, not a confession and not a defense. Report what happened in plain terms: an employee fell from a ladder, an employee’s hand was caught in a conveyor, an employee collapsed and was transported. Give the facts you actually know.
Do not speculate about cause. Do not say the employee was careless, was not wearing his harness, or ignored training, even if you believe it. Do not say the machine was unguarded, the ladder was defective, or the procedure was out of date. You have not investigated yet.
Do not volunteer opinions about whether a rule was violated. Do not promise abatement steps you have not thought through. And do not refuse to report because you think the injury is the employee’s fault or because you doubt it is work-related. Report it, note any uncertainty, and let the investigation sort it out.
One more rule: except to the extent necessary to remove the injured person or prevent further injury, do not disturb the scene until Cal/OSHA has had a chance to inspect it or releases it. Preserving the scene is expected, and altering it invites a separate problem.
The Other Deadlines That Follow
The eight-hour call to Cal/OSHA is only one of several obligations triggered by a workplace injury.
Workers’ compensation. Labor Code Section 6409.1 requires the employer to file an Employer’s Report of Occupational Injury or Illness (Form 5020) with the claims administrator within five days of learning of any injury or illness that results in lost time beyond the date of injury or requires medical treatment beyond first aid. You must also give the injured employee a claim form (DWC-1) within one working day of learning of the injury.
Cal/OSHA Form 300. Under Section 14300, employers that are not exempt must record each recordable injury on the Form 300 log and complete the Form 301 incident report within seven calendar days of learning about it. A serious injury reported under Section 342 is, by definition, recordable.
What Happens After You Report
Expect an inspection. Cal/OSHA is required to investigate every reported serious injury and death, and an inspector will typically arrive within days, sometimes the same day for a fatality. The inspection will include an opening conference, a walkthrough of the incident area, document requests (your IIPP, training records, equipment maintenance records, Form 300 logs), and interviews with witnesses and supervisors.
Employers have the right to be present during the inspection and to have a representative or consultant attend. Employees have the right to be interviewed privately. How you handle those days has a direct effect on whether citations issue, how they are classified, and what they cost. Penalties for a serious violation can reach well into five figures and go higher for willful or repeat violations, and a failure-to-report citation carries its own penalty on top.
What to Do Now
- Write a one-page serious injury reporting procedure and put it in your IIPP. Name who makes the call and who backs them up.
- Post the Cal/OSHA district office phone number for each worksite where supervisors can find it at 2 a.m.
- Train every supervisor that any ambulance transport, ER visit, or hospital admission gets escalated immediately, no exceptions.
- Create a reporting checklist with the Section 342 information fields so the caller is not guessing.
- Verify your Form 300, 300A, and 301 records are current and that the last five years are on file.
- Decide in advance who will manage the inspection and whether you will have a safety consultant on call.
If you have just had a serious injury and need help reporting it correctly, preserving the scene, and preparing for the Cal/OSHA inspection that follows, McNeil Safety Consulting can step in immediately. Learn about our workplace injury investigation services or call (626) 546-9384. We serve employers throughout California.