Professional Liability: What Hiring and Retaining Negligence Might Imply

Errors, negligent actions or oversight of obligations in the workplace can lead to professional liabilities against the employer. This is a valid legal claim regardless if the employer did not intend to trigger damages. It can appear to be unjust. There are two basic theories that can lead to professional liability.

All details herein provided are for informational purposes only, provided on behalf of Searcy Denney Scarola Barnhart & Shipley PA.

For the majority of circumstances, it is the employers’ responsibility to manage their employees’ behavior in the workplace. As a result, employers are partly responsible whether the behavior of an employee is good or bad. Employers benefit from their employees performance (earning profits); therefore, they likewise have a liability if an employee’s behavior leads to harmful actions.

In addition, employers are subjected to professional liability as they are most probably going to be the party to pay damages to the injured individual. The objective of the legal system is to be fair to the injured party. If the employer is given the liability, then they are able to fulfill that objective.

Circumstances that Result to Professional Liability

There are many circumstances that present the probability of a professional liability claim against an employer. Some examples are: job-related accidents, out of scope hiring/retention negligence, and workplace harassment or other similar cases that violate federal law.

Job-Related Accidents

A job-related behavior that is approved by an employer is a negligent action that can lead to professional liability. In addition, regardless if the action is not unequivocally authorizing the action, it is still the employer’s responsibility as long as the employee performs the action within its scope of job.

This implies the legal differences between what is and what is not a job-related accident. Some job-related accidents are not considered as a liability lawsuit; they are qualified for a worker’s compensation claim.

Hiring and Retention Negligence

One illustration of hiring and retention negligence is when an employee performs a criminal action even if it is not job-related. The rationale for this is, the employer is negligent in hiring and retaining an employee with criminal record who may probably cause harm to other individuals. This happens when the background check done is not performed accurately.

Harassment in the Workplace

This is a challenging basis for employers’ professional liability. One cause of this is discrimination established on the basis of nationality/heritage, age, gender, or religion. In addition, reprisal on an employee for participating on other breaches of employment matters can result to a case on professional liability.

The information in this article is provided by Searcy, Denney, Scarola, Barnhart, and Shipley P.A., providing legal services in the field of Professional Liability. This article is not intended nor should be considered legal advice.