“As the Australian business community faces the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, business owners, managers, and human resources (HR) teams are also tackling the ongoing responsibilities to workers and protecting our workplaces,” according to the workplace risk team at insurance broker Gallagher Australia. “Even with new arrangements to work off site, employers must still comply with relevant work, health, and safety (WHS) and workers’ compensation (WC) legislation.”
One immediate challenge is how companies and HR leaders successfully convey how their employees can file a Covid-19 compensation claim for an injury or illness when they are working remotely, according to the article.
While it may be hard for a worker to prove they contracted the virus based on their working conditions at a remote location, “as an employer you still have an obligation to provide safe work duties, so you need a management plan that enables this in terms of working from home and performing appropriate tasks,” Gallagher Australia notes.