Can You Suffer a Workplace Injury on the Way to Work?

By Brett Burlison

Let’s say you are on your way to work in San Francisco (or any part of the Bay Area), and you injure yourself in the parking lot outside your workplace. Can you claim your injury is a workplace injury and file an appropriate legal or workers compensation action as a result?

Well, normally the answer would be no. Many states have what’s known as a “coming and going” rule. The rule works like this. Workers compensation system precludes coverage for injuries that a worker suffers while they are commuting to and from work.

Injury attorneys in San Francisco and all over the country have grumbled at the unfair nature of this law for years. And to personal injury attorneys like myself, it is easy to see how when a person is injured on their way to work, but for their work they wouldn’t have been injured. Well, normally we simply loose that fight.

However, the Supreme Court in Nebraska just ruled in favor of a worker who was injured while walking to work through a parking lot just as he had done every day. The ruling allows the employee’s suit to go forward in Nebraska but it is a win for common sense and for workers everywhere.

If the case goes forward and the injury victim is able to prevail, other courts and other states may take a closer look at this rule that has been harming workers for years.

We need more common sense rulings from Courts here in the San Francisco Bay Area in order to ensure workplace injuries are treated as workplace injuries, even when they take place on the way to work.

Brett A. Burlison, is a personal injury attorney in San Francisco

WEBSITE DOES NOT CONSTITUTE LEGAL ADVICE: These materials are for informational purposes only and are not legal advice. Internet users should not act upon this information without seeking professional counsel. The information contained in this web site is provided only as general information which may or may not reflect the most current legal developments. This information is not provided in the course of an attorney-client relationship and is not intended to constitute legal advice or to substitute for obtaining legal advice from an attorney licensed in your state or country.

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