Every Workers Comp Claim Starts with an HR Decision
May 15th, 2008 by Margaret Spence
During my years as an adjuster, I received countless phone calls from employers saying, “I should have fired him or her,” or, “He or she was a lousy employee,” or, “I’m not sure why I let him or her get away with that,” or, “If I had only let him or her go yesterday, I wouldn’t have this claim on my hands today.” This brings me full circle to why I feel, every workers’ compensation claim starts with an employment decision. As the employer, either you did not provide enough training and oversight to the employee or you hired the wrong employee to do the job or you kept the wrong employee too long. Most workers’ compensation claims can be traced to one of these bad HR decisions.
Let’s evaluate a typical hire for most companies:
There is an open position so you place an advertisement in the newspaper or online. Multiple resumes come in, you narrow your search to ten people, however only three people show up for the actual job interview. Of the three, you decide to hire Jack. After completing the background and reference checks, Jack is told to show up at 8:00 A.M. Monday morning and report to the HR Department to complete his paperwork.
Monday morning, here is the exchange that takes place:
