3 Breaking Rules at Work
Most of the time there are consequences for violating rules at work—whether they are safety rules of the workplace, or directives on how to perform your specific job duties. If you have an accident at work as a result of your breaking the rules, should workers’ compensation benefits be allowed for you injuries?
Answering this question involves looking more closely at the circumstances of your actions. Sometimes your behavior, though negligent, does not hurt your right to benefits. But there are other scenarios where the company rule you broke, also severed your chances of coverage.
Basically, there is a distinction between breaking the rules while performing your job duties, and breaking a work rule for your own personal reasons. If you were doing what you were hired to do, but you violated company policy doing it, you shouldn’t forfeit your workers’ compensation rights.
For example, an employee who drives to sales calls or deliveries throughout the work day should obey traffic laws and other safety rules. He or she might at some point, be running late for an appointment, and decide to make up time by speeding. This would not be a good choice, and clearly not within the directives of the employer. But if the employee got into an accident for speeding or running a red light, any injuries that were sustained should still be work-related injuries for workers’ compensation purposes.
Even though this employee knowingly violated one or more safety rules, the whole time that he or she was in the car was part of a course of performing the duties of the job. It was all about getting from one job site to another job site. Because the employee was injured while in the process of doing the job, then there should be workers’ compensation coverage to pay the bills.
But if you get into an accident because of a personal risk you take for yourself, and not your employer, you could lose your right to benefits. If the employee that is driving for the job got into an accident because, while driving, he or she was texting to make dinner plans for that night, then this would not likely be a case for workers’ compensation. The texting was for purely personal benefit, and not part the job. Since there was no relation between the action that caused the accident, and the business of the employer, then there would not likely be any coverage for the injuries.
Under either scenario, the actions were unsafe and should have been avoided. But for the purposes of recovering under workers’ compensation, the difference between the two can be significant. One is a prohibited way of performing the job, and one is a prohibited activity that is not related to the job.
We are workers' compensation attorneys that help people with Illinois work injuries anywhere in IL via our statewide network of attorneys. Contact us and we will answer your questions or find the right lawyer for your situation.
