Advertise
Resources
Member, Beacon International Group, Ltd.
Workers compensation claims experts love to roll their eyes when California cases get mentioned.
Here is the auto-accident case of a Marsh USA Inc. insurance brokerage employee that makes California eye-roll worthy. For the case involves a “coming and going rule” and after-work plans to stop for yogurt before attending a yoga class.
But a collision with a motorcyclist interrupted those plans.
The motorcyclist sued the employee and Marsh. A trial court granted Marsh's motion for summary judgment, finding that the employee was not within the scope of her employment when the accident happened.
But an appeals court recently reversed the lower court's finding in a decision available here.
The appeals court ruled that because Marsh required its employee to use her personal car for work travel, the employee was within the scope of her employment.
“The planned stops for frozen yogurt and a yoga class on the way home did not change the incidental benefit to the employer of having the employee use her personal vehicle to travel to and from the office and other destinations,” the court said.
This court decision did not arise from a workers compensation dispute, but because there is a coming and going rule in work comp, it makes me wonder whether it might spill over one day.