Picture this scenario: Your employee sends a text message to a customer. The customer happens to be driving when they get that message. While reading that message, they have an accident and injure someone. Could your company be liable for causing the accident? A case tested that theory in New Jersey this month, but the…

It's not as if a corporate risk manager has enough to worry about. Now comes a story about an Iowa company's employee urinating in the empty seats of those female co-workers he found attractive. I've heard of marking your territory, but this is ridiculous. At least he waited until they were out of their chairs….…

I just saw an episode of the television show “Undercover Boss” that offered a good lesson for employers everywhere.  For those of you who are not familiar with it,  “Undercover Boss” is a CBS show where an oblivious CEO who is completely unaware of what actually happens within their company, dons a cheap and unconvincing…

Physician Dispensing will again be before the Florida legislature next year, and word is that legislators may be in short supply. In accordance with established tradition on this subject, I am recommending that Florida employers buy their legislator now, and avoid the post holiday rush. I had the opportunity last week to listen to Florida…

I would like to take a quick moment to welcome a new contributor to our Workers’ Comp Blogwire, Mr. Terry Bogyo. Terry is the Director of Corporate Planning and Development for WorkSafeBC. His current responsibilities include environmental scanning, strategic planning and inter-jurisdictional comparisons. He joined the organization in 1980 as a Vocational Rehabilitation Consultant. Over…

Although I would occasionally write an article or opinion piece for our website over the years, it was not until August of last year that I “officially” opened my own blog, “From Bob's Cluttered Desk”.  It is hard to believe that it has only been nine months. Over that short time I have poked fun…

A couple weeks back I wrote about “Breaking the cycle of entitlement” by asking the question, How can we be better? I received some backlash from injured workers who, quite frankly, misunderstood my point. I responded with a second article to clarify my position. What I was talking about in those two posts was simply…

Well, the birds must be chirping and the flowers blooming with color in the vast Peoples Republic of North Dakota, because it appears that a major news provider in that state has finally awakened from its long winter hibernation to acknowledge a potential WSI scandal that has been going on for months. While the main…

When I first read the recent post from my friend Joe Paduda entitled “Missouri’s Resident Idiot”, I just automatically assumed that he was lashing out at that state’s legislature inducting native son Rush Limbaugh to the honored “Hall of Famous Missourians”. After all, Limbaugh and his beliefs don’t really reside within Paduda’s wheelhouse, as it were.…

I read today about an award issued in March by the Illinois Workers' Compensation Commission granting benefits to a state worker for a condition associated with “repetitive walking”, and it got me to thinking. The claim, from an employee of the Menard Correctional Center, a veritable claim factory in its own right, was awarded benefits…