Employee Death, Stressful Work Environment, Legal Cases, Govt Investigation – EPLI

In the start of the early 2000’s, working in service sectors like banks, IT and ITES was
considered a safe job. People thronged to work in these sectors as they were
physically less demanding, today the whole scenario has started changing, with
mounting competition and everybody in the race for survival has resulted in extended
working hours and demanding deadlines to meet.

Few people learn to balance this but majority succumb to the pressure, sometimes
even death occurs, when death occurs it not only brings grief to the near and dear ones
but also a lot of legal troubles to the organisation which employs them.

Let’s look at the recent case of the lady employee’s death from the Pune based firm,
post her demise there has been several allegations that have come out against the
employer,
·       Stressful working hours
·       Compensation to the deceased
·       Cases filed against senior management or on the company
·       Government bodies like labour ministries filing cases or setting up investigation
teams
·       Past and present employee’s social media talks causing damage to the reputation
of the firm
The case here is against a world renowned the so called one of the BIG 4 audit firms
of the world, if they are bought under the scanner then imagine the plight of smaller
companies, sometimes the organisation or the concerned manager is just a victim of
the situation.

Such incidents are rare but given the gravity they can sometimes cause shut down to a
business, compensation amounts can be so huge that business will sink. Lawyer fees,
court charges are recurring in nature.

How do companies safeguard from such risks?

The only solution is to have an Employment Practices Liability Insurance, a name
very common abroad but not so popular in India. This policy safe guards any
supervisor, manager or director against cases filled on them from employees, their
families alleging toxic work environment, sexual harassment, denial of promotion,
wrongful termination, threat etc.,

This insurance product not only defends the company and its managers but also pays
compensation in areas of racial discrimination, wrongful termination etc.,

The policy does not support any criminal act like rape or murder, rest everything falls
under its scope. If you think it’s expensive, a 1 million US$ coverage costs hardly 1.2
lacs INR per annum.

To protect an individual’s dignity and a company’s balance sheet this is a small fee!!