An emergency action plan describes the actions employees should take to ensure their safety if a fire or other emergency situation occurs. Well-developed emergency plans and proper employee training (such that employees understand their roles and responsibilities within the plan) will result in fewer and less severe employee injuries and less structural damage to the facility during emergencies. A poorly prepared plan, likely will lead to a disorganized evacuation or emergency response, resulting in confusion, injury, and property damage.

Putting together a comprehensive emergency plan that deals with those issues specific to our worksite is not difficult. It involves taking what was learned from your workplace evaluation and describing how employees will respond to different types of emergencies, taking into account your specific worksite layout, structural features, and emergency systems. Most organizations find it better to include a diverse group of representatives (management and employees) in the planning procedure to meet frequently to review progress and allocate development tasks. The commitment and support of all employees is critical to the plan’s success in the event of an emergency; ask for their help in establishing and implementing your emergency action plan.

What should an emergency action plan contain?

How do I develop an emergency action plan?

What are the essential evacuation elements?

In some instances, is it better to shelter in place?

How are portable fire extinguishers integrated into the emergency action plan?

How are fire, rescue and medical services arranged?

What are the options for reporting an emergency and alerting employees?

Your planning process and site-specific emergency plan should address each of the following elements:

· Preferred procedures for reporting emergencies such as dialing 911, or an internal emergency number, or pulling a manual fire alarm.

· A description of the alarm system to be used to notify employees (including disabled employees) to evacuate and/or take other actions. The alarms used for different actions should be distinctive and might include horn blasts, sirens, or even public address systems.

· An evacuation policy, procedures, and escape route assignments so employees understand who is authorized to order an evacuation, under what conditions an evacuation would be necessary, how to evacuate, and what routes to take.

· Procedures for employees who remain on site after the evacuation alarm sounds, if required before evacuating. Employees may be required to operate fire extinguishers or shut down electrical equipment.

· Procedures to account for employees after the evacuation to ensure that everyone got out might include procedures for designated employees to sweep areas, checking offices and securing rooms, before being the last to leave a workplace or conducting a roll call in the assembly. Many employers designate an “evacuation warder” to assist others in an evacuation and to account for personnel.

· The duties, responsibilities, and names of employees assigned with rescue and medical tasks. Most small organizations rely on local public resources such as the local fire department.

· A description of how employees will be informed on the contents of the plan and trained in roles and responsibilities.

· The names, titles, departments, and phone numbers of employees who be contacted for additional information or clarification of some aspect of the plan.

· A list of key personnel who should be contacted during off hours emergencies.

· The site of an alternative communication center to be used in the event of a fire or explosion.

· A secure on-off site location to store originals or duplicate copies of accounting record, documents, your employee’s emergency contact lists, and other essential records.

· Effective plans often call for retraining employees annual and include drills in which employees practice evacuating their workplace

· And gathering in the assembly area.

How do I develop an Emergency Action Plan?

It is essential that the emergency plan developed be site specific with respect to emergency conditions evaluated, evacuation policies and procedures, emergency reporting mechanisms, and alarm systems. To assist you in your planning, a series of checklist have been provided that identify is that that must be considered when drafting a comprehensive emergency action plan. Contact Rick Scott at A Plus Benefits to obtain this checklist.

Rick Scott is the Safety Director for A Plus Benefits, Inc.

In today’s work environment, employees are protected by a variety of safety laws, rules, and regulations and of course, concerned employers. Safety is just good business and it requires a team effort and responsibility by all employees.

Quite often, it’s the hard working, dedicated, loyal employee, who gets busy and tries to take a short cut, or simply isn’t thinking about safety and contributes to the accident cause.

What is an unsafe act?An unsafe act is any personal characteristic or condition that may cause or influence an employee to act unsafely. The conditions may be mental, emotional or physical. Some of the types of unsafe acts could be: unaware of the job hazard, inattention to job hazards, low level of job skill or inadequately trained for a specific job. It could be the employee tried to avoid extra effort or tried to gain or save time by taking a shortcut

1. Does the company have written safety rules and procedures?

2. Are employees advised of these rules through education and training?
3. Is the training documented? Documentation includes what information was taught, when it was taught and who provided the training.
4. Are safety hazards identified and corrected. This is why routine safety inspections are necessary and action taken to correct identified deficiencies.
5. Are safety rules enforced? If yes, management must prove this with documentation. That’s what we want to talk about now.

How do you document that rules are enforced? When an employee causes an accident or injury through an unsafe act, the employee must be told what he or she did wrong and management must explain how to correct the unsafe behavior. We call it Safety Counseling.

Rick Scott is the Safety Director for A Plus Benefits, Inc.

General Reasons
All injuries, illnesses and incidents are preventable. They are symptoms of problems in the safety management process. Investigations are conducted to learn the cause of injuries, illnesses and incidents so they can be corrected and to prevent future occurrences. Investigations are an opportunity to learn and to improve the company’s safety and health program.

Cost Associated With Worker’s Compensation
Safety and health professionals think and talk mostly in terms of hazards, usually involving personal injury. They use terms like “accident frequency”, usually meaning frequency rates of disability injuries and lost workday incidents. To get an accurate snapshot, this data should be provided for at least three years, called the Experience Modification Ratio (EMR).

Prevention is the Key to Your Business’s Success.
When an incident occurs please complete this corrective action report, find out the “root” cause of the reported illness/injury and do you’re very best to correct it.

Rick Scott is the Safety Director for A Plus Benefits, Inc.

The Experience Modification Factor is a critical component of the premium calculation. It is often misunderstood by the owners who receive these ratings.

So, WHAT IS IT???
Experience Modification Factor (EMOD) is a class rated insurance program. That is, within a state, and insurance company applies the same rate to all employers who fall into a give class. For example, all plumbers are subject to the plumbing rate, all sheet metal workers are subject to the sheet metal rate, etc.

The rate applied in each class is an average rate, and does not recognize any individual characteristics of the company.

Because of this, there is a need for a statistically supported means of differentiating one company in a given class from another, for the purpose of determining policy premiums. This is where experience rating comes in, THE EQUALIZER!!!

Because workers’ compensation coverage is mandatory, it is an industry that is rich with statistical information. Each state subscribes to an independent statistical organization or bureau, to gather and analyze data and trends in the industry. For most states, this organization is the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI), although some states have their own bureaus. Every year insurance companies are required to submit to the NCCI or state bureau information for each employer they insure. These reports, known as unit statistical reports, include classification codes, audited payrolls by class, premium and claim information.

The statistical organization then collects the data, which allows it to predict expected losses for each payroll classification based on the historical performance of that business class.

An experience modification is a factor that is calculated for each company who qualifies. In Utah for example, a company must average at least $3,500 in premium for two or more years to qualify for a mod factor.

The mod factor is a value that compares the claim profile of the company to the claim profile that would be expected of an employer of similar size (by payroll) in the same industry (class). A value of 1.00 meaning the frequency and severity of actual losses equal the expected losses. A mod factor greater than 1.0 means the employer experienced worse than expected losses during the rating period, and a mod of less than 1.00 indicates the companies’ losses were better than expected for the rating period.

A companies’ experience mod is calculated using claims data from the three most recently completed years, excluding the expiring term. To determine a 2007 mod, payrolls and claims from 2005, 2004, and 2003 will be included.

So, HOW CAN I REDUCE IT???
The short answer: The first step is to implement and sustain a comprehensive workplace safety program. Effective self-inspection program and accident investigation programs are particularly pertinent to managing claim frequency.

The second step is to manage existing workers compensation claims.

A Plus Benefits has professionals to assist your company to establish these steps.

Rick Scott is the Safety Director for A Plus Benefits, Inc.