What Could a Workplace Accident Cost Your Business?

Accidents and ill health in the workplace will cost your business, but do you know the real cost?

You have some level of safety management in place and you pay your insurance premiums and may feel that you are covered. You have insurance, surely if something goes wrong that will cover your losses?

What you may not realise is that for any workplace accident of case of ill health many of the costs are uninsured costs.

It is estimated that for every £1 of insured losses from workplace accidents and ill health you can expect between £8 and £36 of uninsured losses, thats a lot of money that you could potentially be losing for every incident.

Accidents and ill-health costs can be likened to an iceberg: costs that are recoverable are visible but those that are unrecoverable are hidden below the waterline and are many times greater.

Uninsured costs can include:

• Lost time
• Sick pay
• Damage or loss of product and raw materials
• Repairs to plant and equipment
• Extra wages, overtime working and temporary labour
• Production delays
• Investigation time
• Fines
• Loss of contracts
• Legal costs.

Other Points To Concider

• Losing key personnel due to injury or ill-health can be critical to meeting contract deadlines
• In smaller organisations which have little reserve capacity, a serious accident or an incident such as fire can spell the end of the business altogether
• Loss of business reputation due to accidents and enforcement action can lead to loss of new or repeat business or loss of new investment
• Accidents can damage workforce morale and affect productivity
• Serious accidents leading to injury may be rare but minor incidents leading to costly damage are happening much of the time
• Accident claims invariably mean higher insurance premiums or insurance cover actually being refused.

These cost can be saved by stopping the accidents and ill health from happening.

If you think safety is expensive, try having an accident!