Accidents are bound to happen. Whether at home or while you are out and about visiting friends, you may find yourself dealing with an incident you never saw coming. Some of the fallout caused by an unforeseen incident may include injuries.
What happens if the incident occurs while you are working? When you find yourself dealing with injuries or an illness that can be attributed to your workplace, you may be able to file for workers’ compensation benefits. However, during your workday, there are some times when an accident may occur that would not qualify for workers’ comp coverage. Discover three such times or incidents when your employer may not be responsible for your injuries.
- Your Daily Commute
When you travel to and from work, you may believe that anything that happens during your travels will fall to your employer to cover. However, this is not the case. Your commute and any accident that you find yourself in are not covered by workers’ compensation insurers. This is because you are on your own time and not on the clock for the employer. Even if your job involves you driving, accidents that happen to or from work do not typically count as working hours. However, if you have a contract with your employer that states you get paid to travel to and from work, you will have a case for workers’ compensation benefits.
- Your Lunch Hour
Much like your commute, an accident on your lunch break is your time and not the company’s. You clock out and go out to lunch with others to reboot before returning to the office. An illness or injury during this period is not on company time but your own. There are specific exceptions to this. If your boss asks you to run an errand while you are on lunch, the travel to and from that errand is covered under workers’ compensation.
- Your Social Hour Meetup
Meeting with a group of coworkers, even if your boss is included, does not constitute working hours. Any incident that occurs during this time is therefore not a qualified workers’ comp event. If your employer sets up a mandatory outing and something happens, it may be covered by the workers’ comp insurer.
In times of doubt about whether an incident qualifies you to receive company benefits, you should direct questions to a workers’ compensation lawyer. Act quickly in case you have limited time to file for benefits. Reach out to an experienced legal team, such as the Maryland workers compensation lawyers at Cohen & Cohen, as soon as possible.
