What reporting systems do I need to comply with SB-553?

HSI's Violence Incident Log Management capability meets all of the required compliance metrics of the California workplace violence prevention bill. According to SB-553, an effective log must include the following elements:

• “Date, time, and location of the incident"
  
• “Detailed description of the incident”
• “Classification of who committed the violence”
• "Classification of where the incident occurred"
• "Classification of circumstances at the time of the incident"
  
• “The violence type including whether it was a physical attack or threat, whether weapons or other objects were involved, or whether it was a sexual assault”
• “Consequences of the incident including whether security or law enforcement was contacted and whether actions were taken to protect employees from a continuing threat”

The bill requires companies to have “effective procedures for the employer to accept and respond to reports of workplace violence, and to prohibit retaliation against an employee who makes such a report.”

This means you need to provide your employees a way to come forward and ensure that employees who come forward aren’t retaliated against.

Most importantly, you’ll need to keep a violence incident log, which is essentially a repository of any reports that come in through your established channel.

It is also noted in the CA bill that you need to keep these logs for a minimum of 5 years. In addition, you need to keep a log of any records of incident investigations. For example, if HR conducted an investigation after an employee raised the concern that they were being threatened by their manager, those investigation notes need to be stored and maintained by employers for at least 5 years.