ABSTRACT
Safety professionals should begin to prepare their defenses far in advance of an Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) compliance inspection. The other categories of identifiable defenses which have been used before the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission fall in the categories of procedural defenses and factual defenses. Procedural defenses also encompass the required employer–employee relationship request under the Occupational Safety and Health Act, as well as challenges to the standard itself. Defenses challenging the employer–employee relationship address construction sites, loaded employees, and related areas where OSHA may assume an employer–employee relationship. Thus, the safety professional at informal conference or as part of the legal team on appeal is attempting to disprove what the compliance officer identified as a citable violation. Additionally, it is important to review each and every element of the alleged violation to ensure that OSHA can prove all elements as well as the categorization and proposed monetary penalties.
