|
|
|
COMPENSABILITY OF OFF-PREMISES INJURIES: JUMPP V. CITY OF VENTNOR
Eric Fingerman, Esquire and Jay E. Mintzer, Esquire
The New Jersey Workers' Compensation Act, as originally implemented in 1911, did not specifically define "employment." As a result, the courts developed principles, designed to distinguish between those accidental injuries connected to employment and those injuries occurring outside the scope of employment. An accident arose out of employment "when it results from risks reasonably incidental to employment" and is in the course of employment "if it occurs while the employee is doing what a man so employed may reasonably do within a time during which he is employed, and at a place where he may reasonably be during that time." Livingstone v. Abraham & Strauss.
This distinction evolved into the Going and Coming Rule or Premises Rule, which precluded an award of compensation benefits for those injuries occurring during routine travel to and from an employee's regular place of business, based upon the assumption that an employee's daily routine travel, neither yielded a special benefit to the employer, nor exposed the employee to injury risks or hazards peculiar to their respective employment. Implementation, however, yielded harsh results contrary to the Workers Compensation Act, as social and remedial legislation to compensate the injured worker, leading our courts to once again carve further exceptions to the rule.
In 1979, the Legislature adopted amendments to the Workers' Compensation Act to "establish relief from the far reaching effect of going and coming rule decisions, by defining and limiting the scope of employment." Senate Labor, Industry and Professions Committee Joint Statement to Senate No. 802 SCS and Assembly No. 840 ACS. N.J.S.A. 34:15-36 provides, in pertinent part, "employment shall be deemed to commence when an employee arrives at the employer's place of employment to report for work and shall terminate when the employee leaves the employer's place of employment, excluding areas not under the control of the employer…"
Brought within the scope of the Act, were off-premises injuries sustained by employees who were directly involved in completing employer related tasks (the special mission exception) or engaged in activities approved by their employers and reasonably incidental to the employment (the travel time exception). Also included within the Act were minor deviations; personal habits or errands, such as smoking or making a phone call, to be in the course of employment, even though, unlike the indispensable human functions of eating and using the lavatory, employees need not engage in such activities to perform their work duties adequately. The 1979 amendments were designed and implemented to define employment and clarify on-premises and off-premises employment, which have subsequently been interpreted by the courts to bar compensation for injuries sustained during certain activities (i.e. lunch-time accidents) that prior to the 1979 amendments were within the scope of employment and compensable.
In Jumpp v. City of Ventnor, Petitioner was employed as a pumping station operator. As part of his job duties, Petitioner was required to monitor, twice daily, the electrical and chlorination systems at six water wells, towers and sewerage pumping stations dispersed throughout the City, owned and operated by his employer. In performing said daily task, Petitioner utilized an employer vehicle. Ordinarily, Petitioner was in continuous transit and did not have a set schedule for lunch, coffee breaks, etc. In light of such circumstances, Petitioner's supervisor permitted him to make brief stops for personal necessities, which included retrieving his personal mail from a local post office en route to one of his six job sites. On the incident date, Petitioner stopped his municipal vehicle at the post office en route to his next inspection site, exited to retrieve his mail, and slipped and fell on a nearby driveway causing traumatic bodily injury.
In affirming non-compensability, the Court upheld the minor deviation rule, noting off-premises employees enjoyed the same ability to deal with basic needs as on-premises employees, such as coffee and lunch breaks, phone calls to babysitters, etc. However, the Court noted "[i] n cases involving an alleged minor deviation, the question is not whether the off-premises employee was 'satisfying a personal need, the completion of which is neither incidental to his . . . employment . . . nor beneficial to the employer,' but rather, whether that employee has embarked on a personal errand that would have been compensable if carried out by an on-premises employee." The Court indicated Petitioner's actions were equivalent to an on-premises employee, leaving their office for an afternoon break and crossing the street to enter the post office to retrieve their personal mail sustaining injury, both of which were not minor deviations.
While favorable, the majority's decision unfortunately mandates a near impossibility to accurately draw a distinction between minor deviations and unnecessary personal errands, due in part that the analysis of off-premises and on-premises employees are not interchangeable.
|
|
