Can an accident on the way to the office before a business trip be considered work-related?
I. Introduction
When an accident at work is determined to be work-related, this can provide the injured employee and his/her family the opportunity to more easily get through the misfortune. A certain employee left home two hours earlier than usual to go to his office before beginning a business trip, and got into a traffic accident, which resulted in his becoming paralyzed from the waist down. A branch office of the Korea Workers’ Compensation & Welfare Service Corporation (hereinafter referred to as “the Agency”) rejected the employee’s application for accident compensation, on the grounds that the accident occurred on the way to a gathering place for a business trip, not on the business trip itself, and that an accident occurring on the way to work is not recognized as a work-related accident under current labor laws. The employee appealed to the Agency’s head office for a reexamination of his application, claiming that even though the accident involved his own car and occurred on the way to work, the employer assigned the employee to take part in the business trip and designated his car as the main form of transportation. Therefore, the accident could be considered to have occurred during the business trip. The Accident Compensation Appeal Board confirmed that the company had designated his car as the main form of transportation, and that the accident occurred on the way to work to pick up his colleagues, and so it reversed the branch office’s rejection of his application for accident compensation.
Herein, we will review the main points of dispute and the criteria for determining whether an accident that occurs during the commute to and from work before a business trip can be considered a work-related accident.
II. Actual Facts & Main Points of Dispute
1. Actual facts
The employee drove away from his house (in Daebang-dong, Seoul) at 5:30 am in his own car, which would be the main vehicle for the business trip, to participate in a meeting in Changwon, South Gyeongsang Province at 11 am, June 26, 2015. On the way to the office (located in Anyang City) to pick up the company president (the employer) and a colleague, his car slid on the road (wet from rain) and hit some trees on the side of the road, causing injuries that resulted in him being paralyzed from the waist down. The employee applied for accident compensation, but the Agency rejected the application.
2. Reasons for the Agency’s rejection
In cases where employees receive an order from their employer to take a business trip, are to meet at a certain gathering place and move on to the workplace in a vehicle provided by the employer, the business trip is from the time of meeting at the gathering place to the time of returning to the gathering place at the end of the business trip. Therefore, the time during which the employees travel to the gathering place from their respective residences, and the time during which they return to their respective residences from the gathering place shall be regarded as outside of the business trip. This means that cases where several employees are ordered to go on a business trip and are asked to meet at a certain gathering place and travel to the working place together in one particular employee’s car should be regarded as the same. Therefore, this accident was a traffic accident that occurred on the way to the gathering place while the employee was driving his own car outside the employer’s control. Therefore, the accident is an “accident during the commute to and from work” and is not recognized as a work-related accident.
3. The employee’s claim
(1) The route and means of transportation had been ordered.
The employee usually left his house around 7:30 am, traveling to work either by public transit or his own car. However, on the day the accident occurred, he left his house around 5:30 am, two hours earlier than usual, to meet his employer and a colleague at the office (in Anyang), as substantially directed the day before (June 25, 2016) by the employer, to take the business trip together in the employee’s car.
The place where the accident occurred was on a main road, the typical route the employee used to commute to work from his house. The employer confirmed that the accident occurred while the employee was following company instructions, covered some medical expenses and lost wages, and submitted the Application for Medical Care Benefits on behalf of the employee. Since the employer had designated the applicant’s own car as the main transportation for the business trip, the means of getting to the gathering place was restricted to that car, and therefore the route was also determined. Therefore, as the employee’s car was used for business purposes from the time he left his house on the day of the accident, the employee’s right to use his vehicle had changed hands to the employer, making this accident one that occurred while under the employer’s direction.
(2) This accident was an occupational accident regardless whether it occurred during a commute or on the business trip.
The employee had to use his car for the business trip as the employer had directed, and had the accident on the way to the office (in Anyang) to pick up the president and a colleague who were waiting there. This accident should therefore be considered an occupational accident because the employee’s car was at the time being operated by the employee while he was acting according to the employer’s direction and supervision: the fact that the employee was using his own car for the business trip to Changwon via the company premises in Anyang was in the course of implementing the employer’s instructions. Therefore, the vehicle that the employee drove to the office in Anyang was not the vehicle that the employee could choose, but the vehicle the employer chose, making this accident one that occurred while commuting to work under the employer’s direction and supervision.
4. Main points of dispute
This case revolves around whether a traffic accident caused by individual negligence can be considered an accident during a business trip or a simple commuting accident. Generally, accidents during the commute to work for the purpose of taking a business trip are not considered occupational accidents, but in cases where the employer has designated a certain employee’s car as the vehicle for the business trip, a traffic accident occurring during that employee’s commute to work in that designated vehicle can be recognized as an occupational accident. These controversial issues are the main points of disputes.
III. Legal Principles for Commuting Accidents
1. Related laws
The term “work-related accident” refers to any injury, illness, disability or death of a worker, that occurs in the course of carrying out his/her duties. The criteria for recognition of an accident as work-related: “an accident is admitted as an occupational accident when it happens while the worker is commuting to and from work under the control of the employer, such as using transportation provided by the employer or the equivalent thereof: ① The accident should happen while the worker is using a means of transport which either is provided by the employer for the worker’s commute to and from work or can be regarded as being provided by the employer; ② The worker should not have entire and exclusive responsibility to manage or use the means of transport used for his/her commute to and from work.”
2. Related judicial rulings
(1) A Supreme Court ruling stipulates, “In considering the content of the above provisions and forms and the legislative intent, Article 29 of the Presidential Decree enumerates some work-related accident examples to give requirements for accidents to b
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