who is responsible?

Irie

Employee goes out of town on business for several days. In the evening ee goes out to eat in a restaurant and has a "few too many". On the way back to the hotel the ee gets in a car accident and causes some serious property damage as well as runs a stop sign and injures the passenger of the car he has hit.

Who is responsible? Workers' comp for the ee? Can the injured passenger of the other car sue the er since the ee was out of town on business?

Thanks.

Balloonman1

Tricky one..........will vary by state. But does your company have a policy of not reimbursing for alcohol? That would help a defense. Most likely you are gonna get hooked on the WC........
YOu may also get sued on the car accident. Was it their own car or company car?

My $0.02 worth,
The Balloonman

pork1

Lrie: It would appear to me that you need to suspend the employee pending the completion of an accident in a company vehicle, possibly while intoxicated, if the facts point to our driver as being the person at fault. Then, in our case, a positive drug test /With Breathalyzer test confirmation, he/she would be immediately terminated. It would also appear that the company should assume that there would be a trial for the other vehicle replacement or repaif or suffering, medical cost and personal repair.

The attorney for the outsider will go after the deepest pockets, whether you like it or not. There is ALWAYS the opportunity for the X-employee to develop a claim and sue the company, insurance company, the senior leadership. This then, will drive the owner and the attorneys to argue the finish to the end, with mostlikely one or the other will develop a SETTLEMENT game.

Attorneys (specially the your first year and mid-year attorney) will seek to get his fair share and as much as possible for bothand the FIRM. By settlement both sets of attorneys win with out going to trail. We hold the line when it comes to settlement, we never authorize any settlement because we then enlarge our law suits target. Because of our stance on this fact, we do not loose& we do not deal in the wettlement game. If we are wrong in our findings then sue us over that, but settlemenat is out of the closet and we do not play, We would take our chances with a group of personnel, jurors to pay a cent toward the payment of some off the wall claim.

Good luck, keep us posted.

PORK

atrimble

First, let me say I don't envy your position. This could get very tough. But I would like to make two points. In Missouri, at least, work comp benefits are reduced up to 50% when drugs or alcohol are involved in the incident. You do not state whether the ee was actually injured, though, so work comp may not be involved at all. Your liability insurance sure will be, though. Our liability insurers would try to place the blame back on the shoulders of the employee and their personal insurance company, whether it was in a company-owned vehicle or not, but probably wouldn't be very successful. I would expect the other driver and the other passenger to both file claims with your insurers (property, accident and/or liability). Gather facts and suspend pending investigation - ASAP. All the insurance companies are going to want to know if the ee was representing (i.e. "on the clock") the employer at dinner. Was the ee performing any function of their job immediately before the accident? If so, then the er gets to "share some of the blame." If they were totally off the clock and had been for a while, then push for the employee to take full responsibility for the accident.

Dutch2

I agree with Atrimble. Was this a business dinner where he was entertaining clients or just out for dinner by himself. This quickly gets into the fog of just when is an exempt employee on the clock and when are they not on the clock, especialy when traveling for the company. I am interested in hearing how this turns out. We do not reimburse for alcoholic drinks while on a business trip. If the ee wants to drink such, it is out of their own pocket. It will be interesting to see if this would have made a difference or not in such a situation.
Good luck...

WT

Workers comp pays for accidents and injuries of and in the course of an employee's duties. In many cases, going out for dinner after duties are finished on an out of town trip is not part of the work being done for the employer. As far as the accident, who owns and insures the vehicle in question? That person will be the first to have to pay. If the employee had his own car, you can deny any payment on that just as you can deny that he was working for the company while going out to dinner. Judges and lawyers like to find employers at fault in their relentless search for money. Good luck.