Explain the principles (rules) that underpin reporting and recording accidents and incident.

An accident is an unplanned or uncontrolled event which has led to or could have led to injury to people, damage to plant, machinery or the environment or cause some other losses.

An incident is an instance of something happening; an event or occurrence.

Accident and incidents are things that could happen in any engineering workplace or organisation during the work. A worker is more vulnerable to and accident because they are more present in the workplace than the visitors and the employer. Because of this the reporting and recording of accidents and incidents becomes very important to the engineering organisation, so they must have the health and safety reporting system in place, especially when that reporting underpins from the RIDDOR (Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013) which lies under the health and safety at work etc act 1974. This puts duties on employers, the self-employed and people in control of work premises (the Responsible Person) to report certain serious workplace accidents, occupational diseases and specified dangerous occurrences.

RIDDOR is the law that requires employers, and other people in charge of work premises, to report and keep records of: work-related accidents which cause deaths, work-related accidents which cause certain serious injuries, diagnosed cases of, certain industrial diseases; and certain dangerous occurrences. All that must be reported to the relevant enforcing authority, either the local authority's Environmental Health dept. or the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), without delay.

All incidents are recorded, however not all are reported. Accident and incident are reportable. Types of injuries which are reportable include the death of any person, specific injuries to workers which include fractures, other than to fingers, thumbs and toes, amputation of an arm, hand, finger, thumb, leg, foot or toe,  any injury likely to lead to permanent loss of sight or reduction in sight in one or both eyes, any crush injury to the head or torso, causing damage to the brain or internal organs, any burn injury including scalding covers more than 10% of the whole body’s total surface area or causes significant damage to the eyes, respiratory system or other vital organs and Any loss of consciousness caused by head injury or asphyxia.
Only responsible persons including employers, the self-employed and people in control of work premises should submit reported under RIDDOR.

The information provided through recording and reporting enables the enforcing authorities either Health and Safety Executive (HSE) or local authority Environmental Health, to identify where and how risks arise, and to investigate serious accidents.

All incidents can be reported online but a telephone service is also provided for reporting fatal and specified injuries only.

A report must be received within 10 days of the incident. Accident are reported on the online form F2508

And in the end the HSE and local authority enforcement officers are not an emergency service it’s just who is responsible to for the accident and incident recording and reporting.