OSHA Publishes Final Rule on Operator Certification and Qualification
On November 9, 2018, OSHA published the long-awaited final rule addressing both operator certification and operator qualification. The final deadline for operator certification was December 10, 2018, and certification must be by type but is no longer required to be by capacity. Employers are required to pay for the cost of certification for any currently employed operator, and the re-certification requirement remains at every five years.
Recognizing that certification is not enough to ensure an operator is qualified to perform specific tasks on specific equipment, the final rule also adds a requirement for the employer to conduct a task- and equipment-specific evaluation of each operator, and make documentation of that evaluation available on the jobsite. This is the most important change to the regulation. To read more about this requirement, click here for our recent newsletter on the subject.
