You have activated your account, and set your own userID and password. What next?
FirstReport Online tracks occupational illness and injury incidents within an organization. When you activated your account, you created a rudimentary organizational structure - just the minimum required to get started. Next, you will need to set up the rest of your organizational structure.
The organizational structure of an employer is an arbitrary hierarchy with three levels, determined by OSHA recordkeeping regulations.
1. Employer
2. Locations
3. Departments
It is important not to become confused by labels. The names that FirstReport Online uses to label the levels in the hierarchy are arbitrary. They may not match the labels that you use to describe your organizational structure. Regardless, your organization should fit comfortably within the hierarchy.
Employer
An employer is the top level. An employer may be a corporate entity, such as a company, or it could be a governmental unit, such as a county or a municipality. Or it could be something else.
Locations
The next level is a location within an employer. A location is usually a specific place where people regularly work. A location corresponds to what OSHA calls an establishment. FirstReport Online will generate a separate OSHA 300 Log and 300A Summary for each location you create.
The name that you select for each location will appear on each OSHA Log and Summary. A location could be a specific building, such as a manufacturing plant, or a construction site, or part of a governmental structure such as a Fire Department, Police Department, or Public Works Department. (In the previous examples the "Departments" would be OSHA establishments, not departments within an establishment.)
When you activated your account, you created one location. If your organization only has one location, you do not need to add any additional locations. If your organization has more than one location, you should create the other locations before you begin entering incident records. In any event, you should review the location profile that you created when you activated your account because you may have left some of the non-required fields blank, and now is the time to add any additional information that may be needed.
Whenever you create a new location, you will also need to create at least one department within the location.
Departments
The bottom level is a department within a location. A department is a unit within a location where a particular function is performed. Some examples of departments are office, shipping, and maintenance. Depending upon your organization, you may be better off simply creating one generalized department, such as operations.
When you activated your account, you created one department within your first location. If the initial location has more than one department, you should add the remaining departments before you begin entering incident records. You may also rename the initial department if needed.
Review your setup
It is generally a good idea to review your organization and make a list of all your locations and departments before you begin setting up your structure in the application. Your structure may fit neatly into the hierarchy, or you may have to give it some thought.
This overview has explained some things you should consider before setting up your organizational structure. We have discussed the structure of your internal organization. In the next article, we will explain the some things you should consider when setting up external entities that affect your organization, such as carriers, claim administrators, hospitals, and doctors.
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