New OSHA Rules Coming in 2015

By taking a look at the Unified Regulatory Agenda for Fall 2014, one can see that there are various plans for OSHA and other federal agencies to institute some new guidelines heading into the New Year. OSHA in particular is expected to add three rules in 2015 that will address several items:

• Injury and illness reporting. These rules are expected to go into place sometime in August, and would involve changes being made to OSHA’s reporting system for all occupational illnesses and injuries. Large companies that are already required to keep specific illness and injury records would now be required to submit information online from their OSHA 300 log, annual summary and incident report. According to OSHA representatives, this would make for a more efficient means of data collection.
• Confined spaces in construction. A rule due in March would mean big changes for items involving confined spaces in construction. As of right now, regulations on confined spaces are only applied to industry in general, but these rules could become much more specific in the near future.
• Slips and falls. By June, we should see a new rule from OSHA on steps that companies should be taking to prevent slips, trips and falls. This new rule has actually been in the works for nearly 25 years. It will also establish new standards for fall protection systems.

Other rules that could come down in 2015 would include the kind of access to medical records that OSHA would have, procedures for handling retaliation complaints by employees seeking wrongful termination suits and more.

To stay up to date on all of the latest changes to these regulations, meet with the experienced Dallas attorneys at Whistleblower Law for Managers.