Are you covered by an insurance when working remote?
Remote working is a situation in which an employee works from a location other than their physical office or workplace. This can be from home, in the summerhouse, a café or something else. Remote work provides several benefits, such as the possibility to focus deeply on specific tasks that require uninterrupted concentration. However, working remotely also includes risks that employers and employees alike need to be aware of. In If P&C we are by your side, also when you are working remotely.
Good working practices
In comparison to an office or workplace, employers have less influence on the employees’ working conditions when they are working remotely. For example, monitoring of working conditions, including time, ergonomics and workload can be challenging.
Remote work therefore requires good working practices and a certain level of trust between an employer and their employee. Employees need to understand the risks of working from home. These can include for example issues relating to network connection, IT and security, as well as handling and printing of confidential documents.
Personnel risks can include ergonomics since the home offices may not be as well-equipped as the workspaces at the actual offices. In fact, If’s recent survey in Denmark revealed that over 30 percent of remote working employees have recently experienced soreness due to poor physical ergonomics.
Remote work is here to stay
Over the past decade, remote work has become increasingly popular, and today it is an integral part of our ways of working. One reason is that as the pace of work increases, we still need to manage our private lives. Here, remote work practices offer a solution for many of us.
In the wake of the coronavirus COVID-19 outbreak, remote work has played a critical role in slowing the spread of the virus. Working online, employees have managed to stay safe and avoid getting infected, while allowing businesses to continue to run their operations online during the lockdown.
Occupational safety perspectives
There are various Occupational Health and Safety Acts that also apply to working remotely. The nature and intricacies of remote work must be managed to prepare for potential dangers and problems.
It is good to aim for healthy, safe working conditions for remote workers, similar to anyone working in an office or workplace. This applies to physical, cognitive as well as to organisational matters.
During longer periods of remote work, it is important to promote employee wellbeing from each of these perspectives, including building virtual workspaces for teams for coffee breaks, for example.
As working from home may lead to dealing with private life issues in between work tasks, it is good to keep in mind, that home offices present the same risks as homes usually do in general.
New remote work insurance cover in Denmark
We are happy to inform you, that If has expanded the insurance cover in Denmark, which means that employees now can be fully covered when working remotely.
The remote work insurance is not a Nordic one-fits-all cover, as local legislation requires variation from country to country.
Do you want to learn more?
For further information about our remote work insurance solutions, please contact Senior Underwriter Frank Christensen or Sales and Client Servicing in Denmark.
Understanding Remote Work insurance
If an accident or injury happens when working remotely, it may be covered by the national Labour Market Insurance. It is worth noting, however, that we have experienced incidents where certain accidents and injuries are only covered by Workers’ Compensation when working in an office, not when working remotely.
Grey zone accidents
One aspect to consider is whether the accident happens due to circumstances the employer has an impact on, or if it is due to the employer’s own arrangement at the home office.
Examples of such ‘grey zone’ accidents that might be dismissed by the Labour Market Insurance are:
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Slips, trips or falls caused by objects on the floor, water, toys laying on the floor, or by slippery socks, cables or wires (that are not part of your workstation), or walking on stairs.
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An accident on the way to do something not job related e.g. getting a cup of coffee, buying lunch, bathroom visits or opening the door for the cable guy are not covered.
Help and practical tools
To further support this aim, a remote work training course has been created to share insights and raise awareness on the risks of working from home.
We also offer a practical checklist for remote workers and their employers, please visit the Risk Management Library in If Login to access these contents or contact us.
Not an If client? Check out the sample course for a sneak peek at the Remote Work training.