How do you calculate a contractor safety score?

Multiply each factor by its weight and sum them: severity times 0.40, occurrence times 0.35, and detection times 0.25. With severity 8, occurrence 6, and detection 7, the weighted score is 7.05.

What is a good contractor safety score?

Lower is better on a 1-10 scale. Set thresholds against your own risk appetite — for example, above 7 requires enhanced controls, 4-7 needs standard oversight, and below 4 is low risk. A 7.05 result sits in the elevated band.

Why is severity weighted more than occurrence?

Because a low-frequency, high-consequence event — a fall, an arc flash, a confined-space fatality — outweighs many minor incidents. The 40/35/25 split makes consequence the dominant driver, matching how site risk is actually managed.

What does the detection factor represent?

How likely your controls and the contractor's own program are to catch a hazard before it causes harm. A high detection score (like 7 here) means hazards are hard to detect, which pushes overall risk up.

How is this different from just using TRIR or EMR?

TRIR and EMR are backward-looking frequency metrics. This FMEA-style score also weighs potential severity and how detectable hazards are, giving a forward-looking risk profile you can adjust per scope of work.

How do I lower a contractor's risk score?

You cannot change their history, but you can reduce effective risk by improving detection — mandatory pre-task planning, third-party monitoring, and hold points — and by limiting scope to lower-severity work.

Safety & Workforce calculator

Contractor Safety Score Calculator

Contractor Safety Score blends how bad a contractor's potential incidents could be (severity), how likely they are (occurrence), and how easily hazards would be caught (detection) into one weighted risk number. Procurement and EHS teams use it to prequalify contractors, rank bidders, and decide who needs enhanced supervision on site. Unlike a raw incident-rate lookup, this FMEA-style score forces you to weigh consequence more heavily than frequency, which is exactly how site risk actually behaves. It gives a defensible, repeatable number for gating site access and comparing vendors on more than price.

What this calculator does

Score contractor safety from TRIR, training, and audit factors.
Use it when contractor safety in safety and workforce needs a defensible ranking against other safety and workforce risks for the next review.
It computes a weighted contractor risk score using severity at 40%, occurrence at 35%, and detection at 25%.

Formula used

Weighted score = severity × 0.40 + occurrence × 0.35 + detection × 0.25

Inputs explained

Incident severity rating:
Incident likelihood rating:
Hazard detectability rating:

How to use the result

Use it during contractor prequalification, bid evaluation, or periodic vendor reviews to rank safety risk consistently.
The weightings and 1-10 ratings are judgment-based; two evaluators can score the same contractor differently, so calibrate your rating scale before comparing vendors.

Current U.S. benchmarks

Manufacturing hourly earnings average $30.27 (BLS, Jun 2026), up 4.4% from a year earlier. Median machinist pay is $28.24/hr (OEWS 2025), with state medians on each state page. Manufacturers have 529k open positions nationally (BLS JOLTS).

Common questions

How do you calculate a contractor safety score? Multiply each factor by its weight and sum them: severity times 0.40, occurrence times 0.35, and detection times 0.25. With severity 8, occurrence 6, and detection 7, the weighted score is 7.05.
What is a good contractor safety score? Lower is better on a 1-10 scale. Set thresholds against your own risk appetite — for example, above 7 requires enhanced controls, 4-7 needs standard oversight, and below 4 is low risk. A 7.05 result sits in the elevated band.
Why is severity weighted more than occurrence? Because a low-frequency, high-consequence event — a fall, an arc flash, a confined-space fatality — outweighs many minor incidents. The 40/35/25 split makes consequence the dominant driver, matching how site risk is actually managed.
What does the detection factor represent? How likely your controls and the contractor's own program are to catch a hazard before it causes harm. A high detection score (like 7 here) means hazards are hard to detect, which pushes overall risk up.
How is this different from just using TRIR or EMR? TRIR and EMR are backward-looking frequency metrics. This FMEA-style score also weighs potential severity and how detectable hazards are, giving a forward-looking risk profile you can adjust per scope of work.

Last reviewed 2026-05-12.