OSHA ??

[Old Coastie]

Does carpet cleaning, if your business is occasionally in other states, fall under 29CFR 1910 and 1926?

In other words, must a cleaning company institute and keep records of a written safety program?

Anyone?

 

[Desk Jockey]

Yes I believe so. Bloodborne, respirator, slip fall, ladder you know the list.

 

[hogjowl]

Not if you go to Mississippi.

Not sure why you'd go.

 

[Desk Jockey]

Because Turkey is a lot further?

 

[encapman]

Don't mess with OSHA!

When I was a much younger man we had a technician almost die while he was working for us. He was doing VCT floor care all night (several small accounts). He was instructed to leave the doors to the buildings open and point a fan into the building whenever he was running the propane buffer. Well he didn't do it. And in the morning he was discovered lying unconsci0us on the floor. He remained in a coma for a couple of days. He was placed into a hyperbaric chamber which forces oxygen back into the body. Gradually he recovered, THANKFULLY. Next came the OSHA investigation. I was able to prove that the employee hadn't followed instructions, but that wasn't enough. OSHA looked over my business with the ferocity of a menopausal IRS auditor. Long story short, they hit us with a $30,000 fine. However they negotiated it down considerably because we were very cooperative and it was a first offense. Needless to say, we now take safety seriously! We have a well written Safety Plan. And we have regular safety meetings with our staff (including safety videos). We do our best to cover our rear ends when it comes to safety. We learned the hard way that OSHA doesn't mess around. My advice for everyone here is to take this stuff very seriously!

 

[The Great Oz]

If you have employees, you're governed by OSHA or your particular State's version of OSHA, and any individual State version of workplace safety rules has to be at least equal to OSHA requirements.

During a recent visit we were told us our safety manual should be about 15-16 pages, covering only the things that would be considered hazardous to employees. They've learned that the bigger the manual, the less likely anyone knows what it says, and the less likely anyone complies with anything. A bigger manual also allows you to be in violation of more stuff. You get a small fine for something left out, and walloping big fines for not complying with everything in your safety program.

They told me to throw out the 500 page manual our insurance company provided - they would pretend we couldn't find ours during their visit and gave us 30 days send them a "copy of our program" then approved the 25 pages I sent.

The biggest section of our (new) manual covers driving, as that's the most hazardous part of the job.

 

[Desk Jockey]

They told me to throw out the 500 page manual our insurance company provided - they would pretend we couldn't find ours during their visit and gave us 30 days send them a "copy of our program" then approved the 25 pages I sent.

That actually sounds like progress and someone reasonable.

 

[Brian H]

We have had 5 OSHA inspections in the last 20 years. 4 of them were surprise visits and 1 I had called into their educational division to give us a no citations walk through. They always find something wrong or out of compliance.

The last guy cited us for an issue that the prior 4 inspectors had deemed okay. That was the best inspection we have had, and since it was only a $1500 fine.

See if your state has an OSHA educational division. In Michigan, it's free, though you do have to agree to fix and/or correct anything that is out of compliance.

 

[Lee Stockwell]

My 2 oldest sons are graduates of Murray State's OSHA program and have worked in that area for almost 20 years.

Josh told me there are few real "accidents", most are predictable results of stupid actions.

 

[KevinD]

The last guy cited us for an issue that the prior 4 inspectors had deemed okay. That was the best inspection we have had, and since it was only a $1500 fine.

Don't you just love that. Everytime Code or the Fire Marshal inspects one of my buildings they look till they FIND something.
Many times it is something that has been the same for 10 years.

 

[Old Coastie]

Do any of you use an outside company to provide topics for safety meetings, or write your safety manual?

 

[encapman]

I had a friend write our manual. She handles safety for a large company. We hired her to scale a manual for our company. She worked up a good manual with input from us. Then the manual was further refined to match our operation. In other words, it took some tweaking to put together a practical safety plan that fits our needs. I also ordered about a dozen different safety videos (DVD). During our weekly sales meeting we have a slot where we regularly discuss company safety and we also watch safety videos. Each employee signs a weekly roster showing they attended. Each employee also signs a document showing they've gone through our safety manual. We help them understand the essential safety hazards of our work space. To us it's more than just being compliant, I want to help keep my people safe! Our people are our company's greatest asset.

 

[J Scott W]

Members of SCRT and some other trade associations get a monthly safety webinar as part of the member benefits. Some topics may not apply to your company or operation. But the porgrams are very good quality.

 

[The Great Oz]

The last guy cited us for an issue that the prior 4 inspectors had deemed okay. That was the best inspection we have had, and since it was only a $1500 fine.

No fines, but they made us install a chemical eywash station/shower near our wash floor. Craigslist and ready plumbing made it a pretty cheap fix. The inspector told me leniency was due to a good record overall, we had invited the educational walk-through several years prior, I made it obvious that I was interested in fixing anything they found wrong, and their notes from the previous visit said that we had been interested in compliance. Attitude counts!

PS: The previous inspector told us that whether we were cleaning rugs or running a nuclear plant most injuries are the same - tripping over stuff or lifting stupidly.