Benefits August 15, 2011

Study Finds Telecommuters More Ethical

August 15, 2011 (PLANSPONSOR.com) – In a survey of more than 200 firms, the Ethisphere Institute and Jones Lang LaSalle found employees who work from home commit less misconduct on the job than peers who head into the office each day
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According to Dow Jones News, 68% of respondents indicated they allow their employees to work from home on a regular basis. Eleven percent said work-from-home employees had committed ethics violations in the past two years, but 36% reported visible ethics violations in employees who don’t work from home regularly, and 43% reported non-visible violations for this group, such as expense account fraud, bribery, or social media misuse.   

“You can see why someone working from home wouldn’t get embroiled in some of the things that lead to trouble,” said Mark Ohringer, executive vice president and global general counsel for Jones Lang LaSalle, a real-estate services firm, according to the news report. For example, the opportunity to tell offensive jokes or harass people diminishes when someone isn’t in the office, he said.   

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Alex Brigham, executive director at the Ethisphere Institute, a research organization dedicated to matters of business ethics, corporate social responsibility, anticorruption and sustainability, said it may be the employee’s eagerness to maintain his or her work-from-home privilege that makes that person extra careful to comply with a company’s ethics policy.   

“In terms of the privilege of working from home, they didn’t want to put it at risk because they didn’t want to get called back into the office,” Brigham said.  

There’s also the thinking that if an employer trusts an employee to work out of sight of the manager, that employee is apt to be more conscientious about following the rules.   

“Empowering people and treating them like professionals and adults leads to better behavior. If they feel like they’re being treated well and trusted, that’s the treatment they give back to the company,” Ohringer added.
Compliance August 15, 2011

TN Court Rules against Nissan in Return-to-Work Case

August 15, 2011 (PLANSPONSOR.com) – Tennessee's Supreme Court has found that a former Nissan North American, Inc. worker is eligible for additional workers compensation benefits because the company did not provide her a “meaningful return to work” opportunity.

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According to Business Insurance, the case of Alicia D. Howell vs. Nissan North America Inc. involved a dispute over benefits entitlement for a night-shift production line worker who required carpal tunnel surgery in 2006 and 2007.  After a doctor released Howell to return to work, she resigned and alleged the injury affecting her hands did not allow her to keep up with the assembly line work Nissan provided. 

The news report said court documents show that in 2008, after working a minimum wage job and still suffering from hand problems, Howell filed a petition under a Tennessee law that allows injured employees to seek reconsideration of awards of permanent partial disability benefits if they are no longer employed by the preinjury employer at a certain wage.  In such cases, a trial court may award up to six times the employee’s medical impairment rating in additional permanent partial disability benefits if they do not receive a “meaningful return to work” offer and as long as the worker does not voluntarily resign or retire, and the law also limits permanent partial disability benefits to 1.5 times an employee’s medical impairment rating if he or she returns to work at a wage equal to or greater than their preinjury wage.  

A trial court awarded Howell a 25% impairment rating and additional benefits under the law, saying she did not have a meaningful return to work experience.  However, a Special Workers’ Compensation Appeals Panel found Howell’s decision to resign was “unreasonable” and reversed the decision.  

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The Tennessee high court disagreed and reinstated the trial court’s opinion, noting that Howell still suffered hand problems.  

– Tara Cantore 

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