Hi Keith,

"unwilling to engage in your process "

There is opportunity to examine this from an HR perspective. It sounds like you have a clear process that the worker is not following before they get to the Doctor. Your HR people will know how to deal with workers that do not follow procedure.

and until then was not reported to the business.

Same answer for this second example. Being unfit for work and being disciplined for not following procedure are not mutually exclusive. Both can happen. I hope I don't sound too ruthless. You might want to examine the worker comprehension and retention after these toolbox meetings and while you know about the Doctor's letter, does anyone-else know about it and really understand why you have it?

There is no doubt they are time away from work injuries but how do you report them?

As lost time injuries. That is why we have letters for doctors and reporting processes. We try to avoid the lost time or the misclassification in the first place. IMHO, its rare to get data that is absolutely clean and accurate. You would also have a good argument as to why LTI data is inaccurate and not a useful indicator.

we have tried to get ACC to reclassify an injury

Good luck! I'm a few years out of date but last I dealt with it the health and ACC system doesnt like mis-classified injuries being reclassified into other types of injuries. The multitude of different information systems do not easily propagated a change through the network.

Changing a claim for work-related injury to personal injury is even harder. I've been involved in that several times and the employer is definitely on the back foot. Verifiable evidence is the only thing I've seen that will change ACC's mind.

I read the Judgement and I found section [50] to be key for me - WML wasn't just supplying access to land that was being used for a hazardous activity, the land WAS the hazardous activity.

[66] onwards with regard to the Risk Assessment process. If WML had assured itself the tour companies were completing their own robust risk assessments using regularly updated expert advice, for example, changing the tour schedules according the volcanic activity alerts, would WML have been found guilty? If the tour operators had been performing robust risk assessments it would seem not "reasonably practicable" for WML to duplicate their efforts.

To answer Peter's question though, it doesnt matter whether or not WML had its own workers on the island if it had control. And it was judged to have control. So Yes, I agree.

Thanks, Steve. I'll call during the week. South Island based, Steve.

Thanks for the feedback. Yes, I would appreciate being able to discuss this at some point with someone experienced and knowledgable.

I expect I will need professional indemnity and public liability insurance as a matter of course. I expect I have a way to go before I'll be held responsible for any $40 million buildings being destroyed as Chris recounts, but I certainly understand the necessity at any level.

Thanks for the thoughtful response, Chris. I am a member of NZISM and I have my lvl 6 NZQA Diploma but I am not on the HASANZ register. I'll consider your advice carefully. Its given me food for thought.