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| Cruising for a Bruising?_Sept 2001 |
The Denver Business Journal
Employers may be liable for cell-phone accidents
Amy Fletcher Business Journal Staff Reporter
Your top salesman can close deals while driving down I-25, but he may be opening you up to major lawsuits and additional worker's compensation claims.
Cellular phones have expanded the times and places employees can do business, but they also add dimensions to workplace safety and employer liabilities.
Take, for example, a Cooley Godward lawyer in Virginia who was working on her cell phone while driving. As she talked, Jane Wagner hit 15-year-old Naeun Yoon, fatally injuring her. Wagner is serving a one-year sentence in a work-release program, and her law firm is being sued for $30 million. Cooley Godward's local office declined to be interviewed for this story.
"If they are doing business, it comes right back to the employer," said Bruce Jones, a litigator for Holland & Hart LLP in Denver. "That case has gotten a lot of publicity and that's the first step to there being a lot more cases.
"I also know from talking to the guy who has that case on behalf of the plaintiff that apparently a lot of law firms in that area of the country have instituted policies ... to try to address this issue."
Many people who aren't deliverymen or truckers are doing work behind the wheel. Consultants, lawyers and salesmen have found checking voice mail and returning calls can be done at 75 mph.
But despite legal settlements with employers over phone-related accidents, businesses appear slow to adopt any formal policies on the issue. Several Denver companies contacted for this story said they do not have rules or educational materials on using phones for work while driving, but they expect employees to use common sense.
About 100 million people subscribe to cell-phone service in the United States, and drivers using cell phones increase their risk of having an accident four-fold, according to a 1997 study in the New England Journal of Medicine.
"I'm not sure employers at this point as much as the legislatures may be looking at it," said Bob Lundy, executive director of the Colorado Human Resource Association.
In June, New York became the first state to ban the use of hand-held cell phones while driving on public highways. More than 30 states have considered legislation regulating the use of cell phones while driving.
McClain Finlon Advertising Inc., a local marketing firm, does not have a company policy about using cell phones in cars but may start studying the issue, said Heidi Stevenson, human resources director. The Denver-based firm has about 100 workers.
"McClain Finlon does not pay for our employees' cell phones, and one of the reasons we chose to go that route was ... for safety issues. We have no control whether our people are using their own cells phones and how they are using it." she said. "Maybe it's time for our company to have a policy. I would feel horrible if one of our employees were injured while in the car."
In addition to protecting what most companies consider their most important asset, employers should also consider what such accidents could do to their worker's compensation claims.
"Any time a worker is involved in their job, and they get hurt on the job, there is always worker's compensation liability," said Craig Eley, a partner in the worker's compensation firm Eley, Goldstein and Dodge LLC in Denver. "If you are on the Ferris wheel of Elitch's and you get a business call, you are on the job."
Plus, "whenever you are on the job, if you injure somebody while you are on the job, that person has a liability claim against your employer and against you."
Plaintiffs seeking large settlements often will find employers the most lucrative targets.
The bodily injury liability portion of a dri |
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