Workers Compensation Stress Claims and the increased risk posed by the COVID crisis.

Workers Compensation schemes face an unprecedented scenario: most white-collar workers doing their jobs from home. It is important to recognise that in the ‘no-fault’ environment in which Australian Workers Compensation schemes operate, an employee who can demonstrate that their work or their workplace was a contributing factor to their ‘injury’, will likely have liability for that injury accepted by the scheme.

Clearly the current crisis has implications for schemes and employers beyond the immediate risk of virus contraction. Employers have a responsibility to provide a safe work environment for their employees, and as white-collar workers move to working from home, employers are:

  • obliged to ensure workspaces meet OHS standards;

  • liable for injuries incurred during the course of working from home.

For general WHS information on working from home see Safe Work Australia’s Working from Home page.

Before the arrival of COVID-19, Australian schemes were already grappling with the growing number of work-related mental injuries. Safe Work Australia estimates that each year about 7,200 Australians are compensated a total of more than $500 million for the mental injuries sustained during their employment.

Mental injury claims can also be more challenging to manage for schemes. As Safe Work Australia reports, these claims typically involve lengthy periods of absence from the workforce, contributing to a median direct cost for mental injury claims that is significantly higher than observed for all workers compensation claims[1].

In the COVID-19 environment, we expect workplace mental injuries to rise even further. This is a stressful time for all Australians, and employers must do what they can to reduce the psychological risks to workers and others at the workplace. Employers who’s employees are on the front-line (customer or patient facing) MUST ensure that consideration is being given to the many psychosocial hazards that could be faced.

Psychosocial hazards arising form COVID-19 could include:

  • Exposure to customer violence or aggression – for example in healthcare or supermarkets.

  • Increased work demand – for example supermarket home delivery drivers.

  • Isolated work – for example where workers are working from home.

  • Low support – for example workers working in isolation may feel they don’t have the normal support they receive to do their jobs or where work demands have dramatically increased supervisors may not be able to offer the same level of support.

  • Poor environmental conditions – for example where temporary workplaces may be hot, cold or noisy.

  • Poor organisational change management – for example if businesses are restructuring to address the effects of COVID-19 but are not providing information or support to workers.

Tips for managing stress from COVID-19

  • Regularly ask your workers how they are going and if there is anything stressing them.

  • Be well informed with information from official sources, regularly communicate with workers and share relevant information as it comes to hand.

  • Consult your workers on any risks to their psychological health and how these can be managed.

  • Provide workers with a point of contact to discuss their concerns and to find workplace information in a central place.

  • Inform workers about their entitlements if they become unfit for work or have caring responsibilities.

  • Proactively support workers who you identify may be more at risk of workplace psychological injury (e.g. frontline workers or those working from home), and;

  • Refer workers to appropriate channels to support workplace mental health and wellbeing, such as employee assistance programs.

Fair Work Australia Updates

Covid-19 has inevitably changed our workplaces and to deal with the many unprecedented issues that have arisen, the Fair Work Act has been amended temporarily to assist with the implementation and operation of the JobKeeper Scheme (wage subsidy scheme). One of the provisions under the amendment enables qualifying JobKeeper Scheme employers who have employees entitled to receive JobKeeper payments to enact ‘JobKeeper enabling directions’ which means that employers can temporarily:

  • stand down an employee (including by reducing their hours or days of work)

  • change an employee’s usual duties

  • change an employee’s location of work.

Such employers are also able to make agreements with their employees to change their days and time of work or to take annual leave in certain circumstances. These temporary changes will conclude 28 September 2020. Regardless of whether an employer is eligible for the JobKeeper wage subsidy, employees will continue to be entitled to the provisions under the National Employment Standards in the Fair Work Act and in most cases, a Modern Award.

Sources: Taylor Fry and SafeWorkAustralia

Please note information provided is accurate as at 21 April 2020. Information is provided as comment and should not be relied on as a substitute for detailed professional advice from AB Phillips or professional legal or financial advice on any particular matter. Where you would like additional information and support about the content in this document please contact AB Phillips.   

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