Saved The Company From Some Fines Today

glassman

Checking up on four large commercial jobs today,at # three,I see my lead installer engaged in a discussion with the site safety foreman who also happened to be visited by OSHA personnel.
OSHA guys are crawling over job site taking pictures,checking cord ends,etc.
OSHA guy finds some discarded HILTI shot strips that have unspent loads in our general work vicinity. GC's safety guy spots our HILTI tool cases sitting on tail gate of truck and assumed we were the culprits. Tempers are flaring until I interjected, our scope of work did not require us to power nail our frames,and after I opened up the supposed nail case,(all HILTI products are housed in red storage boxes) revealing our cordless impact drivers and hammer drills.
OSHA dudes were satisfied we were not responsible,and got an apology from site safety guy. I don't know which other trade didn't police their trash pickup,but somebody was getting a fine,just a reminder that something so seemingly minor can turn major real quickly.

ampman

imagine my suprise when i learn that if a rivit comes out of a ladder and you replace it with grade 8 hardware its a 7,000.00 fine i think a new ladder is cheaper

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an army of sheep lead by a lion will defeat an army of lions lead by a sheep

mccarty.74

Money is better in commercial but so are the headaches. 8 years in this business in residential work and have never seen an OSHA rep. The way I look at it, MY safety is MY concern. Men die daily in their line of work in the middle east, but here at home we need to somehow curtail the ever-growing number of potentially unsafe unused Hilti shots? God I hate OSHA!

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What would you say...ya do here?

OGStilts

Not so fast McCarty, A couple of months ago I lined up my mason for a simple chimney repair on a home. Within 2 hours of them starting that job, I hadn't even been to the job site yet, OSHA had stopped by and shut them down for not having scaffold rails and hardhats. My mason was only charging me $2,300 for the job and he got nailed for a $10,000 fine. I still don't know how I didn't even get as much as a phone call from OSHA for that one but I'm counting my lucky stars.

My point is that residential is not immune to the wrath of OSHA and you don't have to be a big national company to catch their eye.

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Chicago Home Remodeling-
Chicago Luxury Builder- Basement Remodeling- Kitchen Remodeling-Chicago Bath Remodeling

mccarty.74

I know, eventually, my day of reckoning will come. I just can't get on board with someone else looking out for my well-being. Let me worry about me and you worry about you. Somewhere along the line, in this country, we've robbed people of their own responsibility of common sense. If it's genuinely and life-threateningly dangerous then it shouldn't be done. But if the worst result would be a bump, bruise, or scratch then let it be. In summation, I have been told that my views on the subject of safety are "immature" but if I don't want to wear safety glasses when I'm cutting a 2x4 I don't need a third party telling me that I must or face a $10,000 fine.

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What would you say...ya do here?

custrel

No it isn't. Your actions impact everyone else on the job.

If you are an employee, your employer could end up being responsible for your actions even though they've told you repeatedly how to work safely.

If you are an employer, you are just begging your employees to follow your unsafe example. If one of them gets hurt because he ignores safety because 'the boss does the same thing,' you're probably looking at a workman's comp claim at the very least.

Additionally, you could, and probably do endanger co-workers with your unsafe actions.

Most people who get hurt on the job, get hurt from falls less than 10'. Most of those are preventable. But a lot of other people get hurt because some co-worker disregards safety concerns and creates a situation that results in an accident.

Say you pin back the gaurd on a saw you are working with, and at some point Joe Apprentice tries to cut something with your saw but cuts himself instead. Is Joe going to be held at fault? Nope. The guy who pinned back the saw will be. And, ultimately, the employer will be as well.

Double-A

Its not you in particular they are looking out for. Look at the history of OSHA and what their mission is. They are supposed to make all workplaces safer for the employee.

Now, maybe that's against your personal beliefs, but its still a fact of our business.

We have to deal with it, no matter what we think. Its much cheaper to operate under their rules, than to break them even once and get busted for it.

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"My clients’ wishes are the center of my attention." -- David Guido, a contractor in Woodstock, N.Y.
New York Times, July 20, 2006

Celtic

So which 3rd party is responsible for driving you to the hospital with a splinter or worse embedded in your eye?


You see...your actions - or lack thereof - DO impact others.

So you decide to "man-up" and get thing out of your own eye....with 1/2 the job site now grinding to a halt because someone decided to DIY first-aid on their eyeball.

You see...your actions - or lack thereof - DO impact others.


What are you...some sort of drama queen that must be the center of attention because your "too cool" to put on a pair of $3 safety glasses?

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mccarty.74

So which 3rd party is responsible for driving you to the hospital with a splinter or worse embedded in your eye?

What would be worse? Binding and having the entire 2x4 stuck in my eye?

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What would you say...ya do here?

Celtic

Being evasive and STILL trying to justify your position

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mccarty.74

I knew when I wrote on the subject that I would elicit these kinds of responses. This is one of the subjects that I feel very strongly on. "Drama queen?" Hardly, rather I much prefer to stay out of the limelight. Maybe I'm a product of my environment, because when I started working in this field I was employed by one tough son of a bitch. And to this day he is one of 2 men that has my untarnished respect. I can't work a desk job because I simply don't have it in me. Conversely, this line of work requires a certain level of immunity to pain. But I didn't bash you for your views on safety consciousness did I?

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What would you say...ya do here?

mccarty.74

No, my position was not proposed for you to accept. Neither do I presume you will offer me yours.

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What would you say...ya do here?

Celtic

You knew you would elicit these responses....prefer to stay out of the limelight.

You can't stick your head in a lion's mouth w/o getting some drool on it.


So what so some PITA did - they was perfectly acceptable 20, 25, 30 years ago - is still acceptable today?

I don't buy it.

"Immunity to pain"?

Ever hear this one:
Hard work shouldn't hurt.


What's to bash?
I chose to get home everyday under my own steam, in the same condition I left in and unlace my own boots.

I chose to not put those working around me in harm's way...so they can go home everyday under their own steam, in the same condition they left in and unlace their own boots.

I prefer not to disrupt the job site, slow production down and add costs.

....and this is a bad thing, exactly how?


My position is simple: Wear PPE.

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bradgunn

This one goes round and round. I don't suppose anybody really wants people hurt on their job site, and nobody plans on getting hurt, but we've all seen the cartoons of a guy with hard-hat, steel toes, eye protection, hearing protection, gloves, back support and knee pads - kinda hard to do any work, might not even be safe.

When I started framing, they took the saw guards off, not just pinned back. But I noticed that it was automatic to lay the saw down with blade away from the legs. Don't always see that now.

I see people (not my crew) using 125# aluminum ladders, broken wooden ladders, improvised scaffold with no rails, roofing without jacks or safety lines. Don't even start on the electric cords other crews bring.

I've never had an employee hurt, but I've got lots of scars myself.

I'm just curious, in the real world, does anybody follow all the regs?

woodchuck2

Nobody follows the rules completely. It would be damn near impossible to get your work done no less the cost that would be passed to the customer. Imagine telling a customer that you replacing a light bulb in a high ceiling will cost at least an hours labor on top of a service call because you have to put on you safety harness, tie your ladder off, tie yourself off, put on your steel toe shoes, safety goggles, hearing protection, hardhat, chaps, knee pads, gloves and back brace just so you can waddle up a ladder 12' and replace a .69 cent light bulb. It would take longer to get yourself ready for the job than it would to do it. I agree that we all need to be safe and there are alot of guys who do not practice job safety but there comes a time when too much safety becomes unsafe. Accidents do happen and will always happen, it is up to you to be safe and have the ability to recognize when others are unsafe around you.

bradgunn

Woodchuck gets it. Custrel not so much - safety is everyone's responsibility, but huge fines for thousands of minor infractions in a job which is always potentially dangerous may not be the best solution.
This is why some posters sound frustrated and anti-regulation, even while they are (probably) trying to be safe as the rest of us.

Tom R

Good points, - - government is not our friend, especially at $7,000 a rivet.

Reasonable fines would be one thing, - - but they've gone way past even raucous self-sustenance.

The fines are 100 times what would be reasonable and then they've got 'brainwash-guilt' as an interference diversion.

I guess I get some of my skepticism from when I first started in construction and witnessed my first boss pay a certain 'business bureau' off to make something go away (that he was completely guilty of).

Oh, - - and he was politely told the next time it would cost him double.

Yep, - - another one of those good old 'protection' agencies . . .

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S Winklepleck

Right, cause this happens all the time If you're not wearing safety glasses when using a tool that creates any sort of airborne debris, you're asking to get something wedged in your eye. You get something wedged in your eye, you've got a good shot at getting an infection in your eye, and that's not a cheap hospital visit. I've heard enough stories of people who have had to have their eye removed because they thought the sliver was no big deal and would come out on its own, and by the time they figured it out that it wouldn't, it was too late, the infection had caused too much damage.

To continue to try to defend your position on this is stupid. If you can't see through your safety glasses, get a new pair. Other than that, there's nothing about wearing them that would cause you to bind your saw blade in the lumber, and even if you did, your eyes are the last thing you'd need to worry about. Go get some safety glasses and WEAR THEM. It's not worth the fines OR the possibility of an eye injury not to do so.

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-Steve

"I need the skilsaw." ... "Why did you bring me the drill box?" "It says S.A.W. on it." "Those are my initials."

bradgunn

Tom R gets it. S Winklpeck (?) not so much.
This thread started with the idea that OSHA was on a witch-hunt for any infraction (what was the problem with the Hilti shots anyway?) If that was the worst hazard on that job site I think they should just say "Nice job, fellas" and go on to the next site.
S.W. I'm sure even Tom runs a pretty good job site, his problem is with bureaucratic lunacy (right Tom?) not safety.
BTW I lied on my original post. I did have a painter lock himself in the bathroom without his mask (charcoal, not paper) which I provided - but that's another post.
Play nicely.

Double-A

They were discarded and were not properly disposed of. They are a gunpowder charge in a rim fire cartridge. They could blow someones toe off or send debris flying with enough force to seriously injure someone. Or, just start a fire. Pick your poison.

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"My clients’ wishes are the center of my attention." -- David Guido, a contractor in Woodstock, N.Y.
New York Times, July 20, 2006