• Employees, former employees, and their representatives must be allowed access to injury and illness records.

Employees, former employees, their personal representatives, and their authorized employee representatives have the right to access the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) injury and illness records, with some limitations.

An authorized employee representative is an authorized collective bargaining agent of employees.

A personal representative is:

• Any person that the employee or former employee designates as such, in writing; or
• The legal representative of a deceased or legally incapacitated employee or former employee.

What is the time frame for providing access to the OSHA 300 Log and 301 Incident Reports?

When an employee, former employee, personal representative, or authorized employee representative asks for copies of the current or stored OSHA 300 Log(s) for an establishment the employee or former employee has worked in, the employer must give the requester a copy of the relevant OSHA 300 Log(s) by the end of the next business day.

When an employee, former employee, or personal representative asks for a copy of the OSHA 301 Incident Report describing an injury or illness to that employee or former employee, the employer must give the requester a copy of the report containing that information by the end of the next business day.

When an authorized employee representative asks for copies of the OSHA 301 Incident Reports for an establishment where the agent represents employees under a collective bargaining agreement, the employer must give copies of those forms to the authorized employee representative within seven calendar days. The employer is only required to give the authorized employee representative information from the OSHA 301 Incident Report section titled “Tell us about the case.” The employer must remove all other information from the copy of the OSHA 301 Incident Report or the equivalent substitute form that is given to the authorized employee representative.

Can an employer charge for the reports?

An employer may not charge for these copies the first time they are provided. However, if one of the designated persons asks for additional copies, an employer may assess a reasonable charge for retrieving and copying the records.