What is RIDDOR, what does it require employers to report under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013, and who does it apply to?
Approach. None of the regulatory collections I can search holds the text of RIDDOR 2013. The only GB source on it is HSE's RIDDOR injury and dangerous-occurrence statistics, which I checked for Schedule 2 descriptions. Everything else comes from official sources only: legislation.gov.uk (SI 2013/1471 and its explanatory material) and HSE's and HSENI's own guidance pages. Most of the web material comes from search-result snippets, so treat the lists below as illustrative rather than the full statutory text.
What RIDDOR is
RIDDOR is the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013 (SI 2013/1471). It came into force on 1 October 2013. It requires the "responsible person" to notify the relevant enforcing authority, and then send a report by an approved means, about:
- fatal and certain non-fatal work-related accidents
- specified diseases contracted by people at work
- certain specified dangerous occurrences
HSE describes this as a duty to report, and keep records of, work-related deaths, injuries, diagnosed reportable occupational diseases and certain dangerous occurrences (incidents that could have caused harm).
What has to be reported
| Category | Where in the Regulations | What it covers |
|---|---|---|
| Fatal accidents | Regs 4-6 | Any work-related accident that kills anyone, whether a worker or not |
| Specified injuries to workers | Reg 4 | Examples include fractures (except fingers, thumbs and toes), amputations, injuries likely to cause permanent blindness or loss of sight, crush injuries to the head or torso damaging the brain or internal organs, and serious burns covering more than 10% of the body |
| Over-7-day incapacitation of a worker | Accident provisions | Report within 15 days of the incident. The 7 days don't count the day of the accident but do include weekends and rest days |
| Over-3-day incapacitation | Record-keeping only | No longer reportable, but you must still keep a record |
| Non-workers taken to hospital | Regs 4-6 | Non-fatal accidents where someone who isn't a worker (e.g. a member of the public) is taken to hospital for treatment |
| Dangerous occurrences | Reg 7 and Schedule 2 | Listed near-miss events |
| Occupational diseases | Regs 8-10 | Diseases linked to specific kinds of work, diseases attributable to occupational exposure to a biological agent, carcinogen or mutagen, and diseases arising at offshore workplaces |
Timing: for deaths, specified injuries to workers, non-worker hospital cases and dangerous occurrences, the enforcing authority must be notified without delay. Over-7-day cases have the 15-day deadline above.
Schedule 2 examples from HSE's statistics: Schedule 2 has paragraphs 1 to 53. HSE recorded 2,912 dangerous occurrences in total for 2024/25 (provisional figure) [1], against 2,951 in 2023/24 [2]. The listed occurrences include:
- any explosion near a diver (para 16) [3]
- the sinking of any water-borne craft or hovercraft (para 48) [4]
- any accident in which any person suffers a specified injury (para 46) [5]
Who it applies to
- The "responsible person" carries the duties. In most cases this is the employer of the employee who had the accident, was involved in the dangerous occurrence or was diagnosed with the disease. It can also be the person in control of the premises where the accident or occurrence happened.
- HSE's list of responsible persons: employers (for their workers), some self-employed people, and whoever controls work premises where a reportable event happens.
- Who should not report: injured people, members of the public and anyone else without RIDDOR duties should not use HSE's reporting system.
- Where it applies: RIDDOR 2013 is a Great Britain instrument. According to HSENI, the 2012-2013 GB changes were consulted on and not adopted in Northern Ireland, which keeps its own reporting rules administered by HSENI.
I can give you HSE's RIDDOR statistics broken down by year or by Schedule 2 paragraph if that would help.
Sources: