KubitDocs
Find my documents

KubitDocs · Guides

Is an accident book a legal requirement?

For a lot of builders, yes, and possibly for more of them than the ten-person rule suggests. The duty is not in health and safety law. It is in regulation 25 of the Social Security (Claims and Payments) Regulations 1979, which has two routes in.

  • Ten or more people. It applies to any employer who normally has ten or more people employed at the same time on or about the same premises.
  • Mines, quarries and factory premises. It also applies to an employer who owns or occupies a mine, a quarry, or premises to which any provision of the Factories Act 1961 applies.

The second route matters on site. Section 127 of the Factories Act still applies some of its provisions to building operations, and section 127(4) says those provisions have effect as if the place where the work is done were a factory. Whether that brings a small builder's site within regulation 25 is not settled. If you employ people on site, the safe course is to keep a book, or take advice before deciding you do not need one.

What the regulation requires

Regulation 25(3) says the employer must keep a means of recording accidents readily accessible, in a book or by electronic means. The form has to be one the Secretary of State has approved. An injured employee, or someone acting for them, uses it to record any accident that caused them personal injury. Each record is kept for at least three years from the date it was entered.

Schedule 4 sets out what each entry records:

  1. The injured person — full name, address and occupation.
  2. When — the date and time of the accident.
  3. Where — the place it happened.
  4. What happened — the cause and nature of the injury.
  5. Who is writing it, if not the injured person — their name, address and occupation.

There is no minimum injury. "Any accident causing personal injury" includes the cut hand that needed a plaster.

Who fills it in

The injured person, or someone on their behalf: a first aider, the supervisor, a workmate. Regulation 24 covers an employed earner injured in an accident for which benefit may be payable. It requires them to tell the employer as soon as practicable, and an entry in the book made as soon as practicable counts as that notice.

Then the employer acts. Regulation 25(1) requires the employer to take reasonable steps to investigate every accident reported this way. Where the findings differ from the entry, the employer must record what they found. The entry is the injured person's account; the investigation is yours.

Keeping personal details private

An entry holds a name, a home address and a description of an injury. The ICO's guidance says health data includes any information on injury. Health data is special category data, which Article 9 of the UK GDPR prohibits processing unless one of its conditions applies. Article 5 adds that personal data must be limited to what is necessary, kept no longer than necessary and kept secure.

On site, the risk is an open book on the cabin desk, where the next person to write in it reads the last entry. The practical answer is to separate the personal details once an entry is made and file them where only the people who need them can see them.

The accident book does not report anything

Writing an injury in the book tells nobody outside your business. Reporting under RIDDOR 2013 is a separate duty:

  • Specified injuries under regulation 4(1) include:
  • fractures diagnosed by a doctor, other than to fingers, thumbs and toes;
  • amputations;
  • loss of consciousness caused by head injury or asphyxia.

The enforcing authority must be told by the quickest practicable means without delay, with a report within 10 days. - Over-seven-day injuries, where someone is off routine work for more than seven consecutive days (not counting the day of the accident), must be reported within 15 days of the accident.

RIDDOR regulation 12 also requires a record of reportable incidents, and of work injuries that keep someone off routine work for more than three consecutive days. The record is kept for at least three years. HSE says employers who must keep an accident book can use it for those injury records, though cases of disease need a separate method.

So the book can be the RIDDOR record. It is never the RIDDOR report. HSE takes every report online; fatal accidents and specified injuries to workers can also be reported by phone.

Common questions

We have fewer than ten people. Do we need one? Possibly. Ten people is only one route into regulation 25. The other covers premises the Factories Act 1961 applies to, and that Act treats a building site as a factory for the provisions it applies to building operations. Whether that brings a small builder's site within regulation 25 is not settled, so the safe course is to keep one. RIDDOR's recording duty applies whatever your size.

Can it be electronic? Yes. Regulation 25(3) allows "a book or books or … electronic means".

How long do we keep entries? At least three years under both regulation 25 and RIDDOR regulation 12. The UK GDPR says no longer than necessary, so decide an end date and write it down.

What about near misses? The book is for injuries. A near miss goes on an incident and near-miss report.

Whose book is it on a shared site? Regulation 25 puts the duty on each employer. A site book kept by the principal contractor does not change who the injured person's employer is.

What a template does not do

Our First-Aid and Injury Record Book is not the statutory accident book under regulation 25, and it makes no claim to be the form the regulation refers to. It is a record to keep alongside the statutory book, or to use where regulation 25 does not apply to you. It gives you the five particulars, a detachable personal-details section and a prompt to check RIDDOR.

If regulation 25 applies to you, check which form you must use. HSE publishes its own accident book, BL510.

No record book investigates the accident or makes the report. Those stay with the employer. What our documents can and cannot promise.

Documents for this work