Corporate Culture - "Preventable Injuries"

Recently, Communications Workers of America (CWA) won an important victory re. telecom giant  AT&T's injury discipline program. The case involved a company technician who fell while walking on an icy surface during an installation call and injured his arm. Under AT&T's safety policy, discipline was imposed against the worker once he sought medical treatment for the injury. The employee was suspended for a day for allegedly sustaining a "preventable occupational accident" by not following AT&T's safety rules.

Under the company's policy, such disciplinary action remains on the worker's record for five years. AT&T's action was challenged as discriminatory under Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA). The Agency concluded that AT&T had discriminated against the employee by suspending him for engaging in a "protected activity"- i.e., the reporting of an on-the-job injury. Further, the Agency concluded AT&T 's policy violated the Michigan OSHA statute as well as federal OSHA guidelines.

The ALJ held that AT&T's decision to discipline employees for reporting injuries sustained on the job, even when there is no proof that they violated any specific company safety policy, was arbitrary and discriminatory, in violation of federal OSHA guidelines. The company's ability to impose disciplinary sanctions on workers "with or without just cause" using "broad and vague definitions of safety rules or policy to label accidents as preventable" was found to discourage employees from reporting injuries in violation of federal and state law.

As the ruling indicated:
... the practice of employers creating disincentives to discourage injury reports has happened enough times that the Federal OSHA program addresses the issue in investigation guidelines used nationally. Employers save money when employees do not seek medical treatment at the expense of the employer. Further, supervisors who get bonuses based on injury records of employees under their supervision have motivation to discourage reported injuries. Therefore, it can be in the employer's interest to discourage the reporting of injuries that require treatment.

Because AT&T used "arbitrary standards" to assign the label of "preventable" injuries to any set of circumstances, "coupled with a plausible motive to create disincentives to the exercise of protected activity," the ALJ found AT&T's discipline of the employee was an adverse action for the exercise of the protected activity of reporting a job related injury" and thus a violation of the Michigan OSHA statute.