Employee sued for benefits after injury at on-site charity event: Who won?

A company hosts a voluntary fundraising event during an unpaid lunch period and an employee slips and gets hurt. Should she get comp benefits?
For the past 15 years American Greetings Corp. has sponsored a United Way fundraising campaign, which has included a race in the company cafeteria during workers’ unpaid lunch hour.
For its most recent campaign, lanes for the race were marked off with streamers on the floor. Employee Shelia Bunch ran the race and injured her knee when she slipped on a streamer and fell to the floor.
She then applied for workers’ comp benefits. The company disputed the claim, saying the injury wasn’t work related.
The company’s rationale: She was off the clock when she was injured, and the race occurred outside the course and scope of her employment.
Who do you think won?
The decision
A Kentucky state court ruled that the injury was work related because it occurred in the middle of Bunch’s work day when she was likely to remain on the employer’s premises and continue to be within the scope of her employment.
Under Kentucky state law, this type of charity event qualifies as work related if it occurs on the employer’s premises during a lunch or recreational period as a regular incident of employment.
The company argued the event wasn’t a regular incident because it only occurred annually.
However, the court said once a year is enough to qualify as a “regular event.”
Case closed. Bunch got workers’ comp.
Cite: American Greetings Corp. v. Bunch
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