The occupational health and safety service performs advisory and control functions in the field of occupational health and safety. In some situations, the tasks of the OHS service may be performed by the employer itself. As a result, they do not have to appoint an employee or employ a specialist from outside the workplace.

The occupational health and safety service performs advisory and control functions in the field of occupational health and safety. The scope of activities of the OHS service includes, in particular:

• carrying out inspections of working conditions and compliance with health and safety regulations and rules,
• informing the employer on an ongoing basis about the identified occupational hazards, along with proposals aimed at removing these hazards,
• submission of proposals regarding occupational health and safety requirements in existing and newly introduced production processes,
• presenting the employer with proposals concerning the maintenance of ergonomic requirements at workstations,
• issuing opinions on detailed instructions on occupational health and safety at individual workplaces.

An important role in the scope of the OHS service is to participate in determining the circumstances and causes of accidents at work and in the development of conclusions resulting from the investigation of the causes and circumstances of these accidents and the incidence of occupational diseases, as well as the control of the implementation of these conclusions. The scope of activities of the OHS service also includes keeping registers, compiling and storing documents concerning accidents at work, diagnosed occupational diseases and suspicions of such diseases, as well as storing the results of tests and measurements of factors harmful to health in the work environment.

It is mandatory for an employer with more than 100 employees to create an occupational health and safety service. On the other hand, an employer employing up to 100 employees entrusts the performance of the tasks of the occupational health and safety service to an employee employed in another job. In the absence of competent employees, the employer may entrust the performance of the tasks of the occupational health and safety service to specialists from outside the workplace.

The Labour Code also provides that the employer may perform the tasks of the occupational health and safety service on its own. This is permissible if the employer has completed the training necessary to perform the tasks of the OHS service and if it employs up to 10 employees.

The tasks of the occupational health and safety service may also be performed by an employer employing up to 50 employees who are classified as a group of activities for which no higher than the third category of risk has been established within the meaning of the provisions on social insurance for accidents at work and occupational diseases. Groups of activities for which no higher than the third risk category has been determined are defined in the Regulation of the Minister of Labour and Social Policy of 29 November 2002 on the differentiation of the interest rate of social insurance contributions for accidents at work and occupational diseases depending on occupational hazards and their consequences (Journal of Laws of 2022, item 740).

An employer who performs the tasks of the occupational health and safety service undergoes training before undertaking these tasks. The training should be organized in the form of a course or seminar – including exercises and with the use of appropriate teaching aids, in particular films, whiteboards, foils for displaying information, computer programs, exercise materials. Participants should also be provided with materials to learn the topics covered by the training programme (e.g. scripts, legal provisions, sets of exercises with instructions, sets of control questions).

The training participant should acquire knowledge and skills in the field of:

• identification and analysis of occupational hazards and risk assessment of those hazards;
• conducting inspections and assessments of the state of occupational health and safety, including compliance with health and safety regulations and rules,
• organising undertakings aimed at ensuring the safety and health of employees,
• methods of eliminating or limiting the impact of factors harmful to health and dangerous on employees,
• determining the circumstances and causes of accidents at work and occupational diseases, as well as determining the necessary preventive measures,
• methods and organisation of training in the field of occupational safety and health;
• popularization of occupational health and safety issues.

Source: https://kadry.infor.pl/bhp/bezpieczenstwo-pracy/6494090,sluzba-bhp-kiedy-pracodawca-moze-samodzielnie-wykonywac-zadania-sluzb.html

Supported by Norway through Norway Grants 2014-2021, in the frame of the Programme “Social Dialogue – Decent Work”.