Injury and illness recordkeeping responsibility under OSHA requirements is determined by supervision. Employers must record the injuries and illnesses of temporary workers if they supervise such workers on a day-to-day basis. Day-to-day supervision occurs when “in addition to specifying the output, product or result to be accomplished by the person’s work, the employer supervises the details, means, methods and processes by which the work is to be accomplished.” (Essentially, an employer is performing day-to-day supervision when that employer controls conditions presenting potential hazards and directs the worker’s activities around, and exposure to, those hazards.)

In most cases, the host employer provides this supervision.

While the staffing agency may have a representative at the host employer’s worksite, the presence of that representative does not necessarily transfer recordkeeping responsibilities to the staffing agency, OSHA says. As long as the host employer maintains day-to-day supervision over the worker, the host employer is responsible for recording injuries and illnesses.

The non-supervising employer (generally the staffing agency) still shares responsibility for its workers’ safety and health. The staffing agency, therefore, should maintain frequent communication with its workers and the host employer to ensure that any injuries and illnesses are properly reported and recorded. Such communication also alerts the staffing agency to existing workplace hazards and to any protective measures that need to be provided to its workers. Ongoing communication is also needed after an injury or illness so the recording employer can know the outcome of the case.

The staffing agency and host employer must set up a way for employees to report work-related injuries and illnesses promptly and tell each employee how to report work-related injuries and illnesses. In addition, employees, former employees, their personal representatives, and their authorized employee representatives have the right to access the injury and illness records.

In order to provide safe working conditions, information about injuries and illnesses should flow between the host employer and staffing agency. If a temporary worker sustains an injury or illness and the host employer knows about it, the staffing agency should be informed, so the staffing agency knows about the hazards facing their workers. Equally, if a staffing agency learns of an injury or illness, they should inform the host employer so that future injuries might be prevented, and the case is recorded. As a best practice, the staffing agency and host employer should establish notification procedures to ensure that when a worker informs one employer of an injury or illness, the other employer is apprised as well. The details of how this communication is to take place should be clearly established in contract language.