Employer liability travels with employees

A South Australian tribunal decision provides a caution to employers who provide non-work related benefits to their employees while on work trips.

An employer is likely to be responsible for an employee’s injury or death, if it occurs during any activity that is provided or encouraged by the employer.

The tribunal decision required workers compensation to be paid to the widow of an employee who died while using a hotel gym on a work trip. The employer’s inclusion of the gym access with the provided hotel room was the basis for the decision.

Here it was accepted that, although there was no actual encouragement, the access that the employee was given to use to the gym was implied encouragement from the employer to exercise. Due to the implied encouragement, the employee’s fatal heart attack was ‘in connection with work’ and requiring of workers compensation.

The decision is available here.

Considerations

When planning employee’s work trips away from home, consider what is being provided to the employee. While there will be minimum requirements under Awards or Enterprise Agreements regarding accommodation and reimbursements, the bookings made to honour these requirements often come with additional benefits.

Facilities like pools, gyms and spas may seem like an easy way to improve the quality of an employee’s leisure time while on work related trips. Similarly, employers may be tempted to treat their employees to events or activities outside their normal working hours, in order to offset the burden of being away from home.

Key Take-Away

While providing access to these types of benefits is entirely reasonable, these benefits are accompanied by risk and liability for the employer.

For employers, the most important consideration is whether liability for injury and death, flowing from employee activities on work related trips, are covered under their workers compensation policy.

It is recommended that employers contact their insurer to discuss whether there are any practical steps that need to be taken to ensure protection by the policy.

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