The ACC levy is based upon the assessable part of your accident cover payroll and also the cost of work-related injuries suffered by your industry sector. If you work in an industry with high numbers of and high cost injuries then your ACC levy will reflect this.
However, the focus of the new 2001 ACC Act is on injury prevention and to promote this ACC has developed some optional programmes which reward employers who have health, safety and management systems by reducing their ACC levies.
One of the programmes is called the “ACC Partnership programme”, which allows employers to take responsibility for health and safety in their own workplace. ACC suggests that this programme is more suitable to an employer with an ACC levy which exceeds $37,000.00 per year.
The other programme is called the “ACC Workplace Safety Management Practices Programme” which aims at encouraging employers to implement health and safety systems in the workplace, which improve the safety of employees. ACC suggests that this programme is more suited to employers who have established health and safety systems in their workplace.
While both of the above programmes are quite different, they do share the same focus of rewarding employers who take an active role in implementing and maintaining health, safety and management systems and practice in the workplace. To become part of either programme, you are required to apply to ACC and pass an ACC audit of your workplace’s safety, health and management systems. If you think that you may be eligible to apply, the ACC website: http://www.acc.co.nz provides information and details of the entry requirements for either programme, as well as providing information on the types of discount you may be eligible for if you were accepted into either programme.
While the “ACC Workplace Safety Management Practices Programme” is considered to be more appropriate to a workplace with established, health, safety and management practices, if you do not have an established health safety and management system, the ACC website provides information on setting up the systems required to have a safe workplace. As well as ACC’s website you may be interested in looking at Occupational Safety and Health’s website http://www.osh.dol.govt.nz. Both websites provide guidelines for health and safety in different industries as well as providing up-to-date changes on safety standards and requirements.
For an employer, with no existing health, safety and management systems having a safe workplace doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive. Depending on your particular industry having a safe workplace may just include things such as:
- having a fully stocked first aid kit,
- plans for emergencies,
- safety equipment,
- listening to employees concerns about safety and responding to those concerns,
Another aspect is making plenty of time for instructing employees on:
- the hazards of the job,
- how to use equipment properly and safely,
- the safest way to complete a task
- how to keep themselves safe in the workplace
- if injuries do occur putting systems in place to make sure that they don’t occur again.
Accidents will always happen no matter how careful you are or how sophisticated your heath safety and management systems are. However the rewards of implementing a safety system into your workplace are possible levy reductions and it may also mean that you don’t lose good employees to accidents that could have been prevented.
Nicky Elliot isa staff solicitor at Preston Russell Law. You can contact her by clicking here.
