Health and safety incident (internal) - notification and management guidelines

Application

All University members on all University facilities and all other University work areas.

Purpose

To ensure all work-related injuries, incidents (non-injury) and observations are reported and managed appropriately internally.

Guidelines

In conjunction with taking immediate and appropriate action to mitigate the effects of an incident, the Person in Charge must notify the Manager responsible for the place of work where the incident occurred.

Once notified, the manager must then ensure that that all interested parties are notified as soon as possible, in accordance with the following table and that actions are taken to prevent any further harm or loss.

The following link is to a resource available to staff only.

Incident Level Consequence Descriptor Notification Timeframes Investigation Minimum Requirements

Level 0

 

Insignificant /Minor

Personal Injury:

  • No treatment required
  • First aid injury (FAI)

 

Potential for Harm:

  • Near miss
  • No significant potential learnings

Within 24 hrs

  • Person in Charge 

Within 2 days

  • Incident report (triggers automatic email notifications)
  • Triage and report only
  • Trending analysis

Level 1

 

Minor

 

Basic

Investigation

Personal Injury:

  • Medical treatment injury (MTI)

Minor Potential for Harm:

  • Potential for more significant harm (under slightly different circumstances could have resulted in a lost time injury)
  • Some learnings (human errors and/or multiple organisational failures and/or learnings for University)

ASAP

Person in Charge

Line Manager / Academic Leader

Within 24 hrs

  • HSW Manager
  • Dean, HOD, HOS, Director
  • Incident report (triggers automatic email notifications)
  • Line Manager Investigator
  • Basic investigation (e.g. 5-Whys)
  • Approved by HSW Manager

Level 2

 

Moderate

 

Full

Investigation

Personal Injury:

  • Lost time injury (LTI) or
  • Notifiable event

Significant Potential for Harm:

  • Potential for life changing harm (under slightly different circumstances could have resulted in a life changing injury) 
  • Significant learnings (multiple human errors and/or multiple organisational failures and/or significant learnings for University)

ASAP

  • Person in Charge
  • Line Manager / Academic Leader
  • HSW Manager

Within 2 hrs

  • AD HSW
  • Risk Office
  • Human Resources Director
  • Dean, HOD, HOS, Director
  • Vice-Chancellor

Within 24 hrs

  • Incident report
  • Initial Safety Alert

With 5 Working Days

  • Simple ICAM Report
  • Final Safety Alert
  • Update Incident report
  • HSW Manager Investigator
  • Peer reviewed by an AD HSW
  • Approved by University Organisation Structure Level 2 Manager

Level 3

 

Major

 

Independent

Full

Investigation

Personal Injury:

  • Death
  • Significant notifiable event

Significant Potential for Harm:

  • Potential for multiple fatalities
  • Potential for public notifiable event
  • Potential for significant harm to University busines

ASAP

  • Person in Charge
  • Line Manager / Academic Leader
  • HSW Manager
  • AD HSW
  • Risk Office via Intranet
  • Human Resources Director
  • Dean, HOD, HOS, Director
  • Vice-Chancellor
  • University Council

Within 8 hrs

  • Initial Incident report
  • Initial Safety Alert

10 Working Days

  • Full ICAM report
  • Final Safety Alert
  • Update Incident report
  • External Specialist Investigator
  • Peer reviewed by an AD HSW and legal
  • Approved by University Organisation Structure Level 1 VC

Note: privileged information

Definitions

The following definitions apply to this document:

Academic leader including Academic Supervisors, Research Supervisors, Research Group or Institute Leaders and Principal Investigators refers to any staff member with supervisory responsibilities for students or research. 

ICAM refers to the Incident Cause Analysis Method for analysing data gathered and organised during an incident investigation.

Incident report refers to the electronic submission of the incident information into the University Health and Safety management information system. The submission of the incident report triggers an automated incident notification to the line manager via email.

Managers refers to a staff member that has direct reports. 

Notification refers to contacting someone in person or by phone call or email.

Person in charge refers to the staff member, student or contractor in charge of a particular situation, having the responsibility, control, or supervision over something or someone.

Staff member refers to an individual employed by the University on a full or part time basis. 

University means the University of Auckland and includes all subsidiaries.

University facilities refers to all land and buildings and parts of them operated, controlled, or occupied by the University and includes remote campuses or other sites such as Leigh Marine Laboratory, Tai Tokerau Campus, University controlled halls of residence, covered car parks, the Maraes including those on the City and Epsom Campuses and Falé.

University incident levels describe four severity levels and organisational response as defined  by the Risk Office that these guidelines align to.

University members means those persons who make up the University as set out in s3(2) of The University of Auckland Act 1961 and all employees, students, Council committee members, and employees of University owned companies and where appropriate contractors and sub-contractors and invitees.

University work areas include all University facilities and residential property and means of transport if used for work, and public areas where university activities such as research, teaching, fieldwork or other academic or ancillary activities might take place with University oversight or involvement, both permanent or temporary.

Key relevant documents

Document management and control

Document Control
Version: 1.0
Last Updated: Aug 2020
Next Review: Aug 2023
Owner: hsw@auckland.ac.nz
Approver: Associate Director, Health Safety & Wellbeing