A major transport company [Toll Group] is using private investigators to follow injured workers who take leave to recover from workplace injuries, reports the Sydney Morning Herald. How SICK!
Injured workers spied on by giant transport company
The Toll Group will be taken to the national industrial umpire today by a worker who says she was unfairly dismissed after the company had her followed in February this year.
It is the first of two unfair dismissal claims against Toll this week involving the use of private investigators to look into workplace injuries.
While WorkSafe and its insurance companies, along with government agencies like Centrelink, often use private investigators to look into injury or welfare claims, it is less common for individual companies to spy on their employees.
Toll is understood to be carrying out dozens of investigations on employees who sustain workplace injuries each year.
In the case at Fair Work Australia today, Toll’s head of human resources authorised investigators Asia Pacific Security to follow employee Rosa Diehm while she was on sick leave in February.
Ms Diehm was in the process of lodging a WorkCover claim over a back injury she said she sustained while working at Toll’s Truganina warehouse, sorting packages for Kmart. Toll had Ms Diehm followed for a day in February, from 7.30am to 4.30pm.
Ms Diehm was filmed from outside her house by an investigator, and later, using a concealed camera, at a supermarket for 13 minutes.
She was sacked three days later, after failing to mention the supermarket trip when quizzed by managers about her movements that day.
Ms Diehm said the surveillance by a private investigator had left her paranoid and angry. ”Every day I’m thinking someone is watching me,” she said.
A spokesman for Toll said that employers were permitted to carry out reasonable inquiries to ensure an employee was entitled to an employment benefit being claimed.
”Like other organisations with this responsibility, Toll investigates claims of personal injury at work to ensure any payments being made are able to be justified. Those inquiries may include surveillance of an employee,” he said, noting that this was done in accordance with all legal obligations.
Ms Diehm is being represented by the National Union of Workers at today’s hearing, and its Victorian secretary, Tim Kennedy, said his union had grave concerns about the use of private investigators to follow workers from their homes and out of hours.
”It’s not a nice way to live to be always having to look over your shoulder,” he said .
Employment law expert Andrew Stewart, from Adelaide University, said this kind of surveillance was legal and ”not unknown – though it’s more commonly used to resist a workers compensation claim”.
”There’s nothing unlawful about it, so long as the investigators don’t engage in trespass, secretly tape conversations [or] tap phones,” Professor Stewart said.
Surveillance migh be legal if carried out to the letter of the law,and the majoriy of us know that it isn’t. And now this Sacked employee may have been caused a Psychiatric condition such as Paranoia, she clearly fears being watched and stalked like many of us. Can she now Claim a further injury???????????
This is, in my opinion, a form of workplace bullying. As we know, workplace bullying does lead to psychological injuries. Anxiety, depression and yes, paranoia when being relentlessly stalked.
I was recently told that all conversations in my house would have been recorded. What! I said, that’s not possible, its illegal! Yes, I was told, it is but they still do it. So now that Ive talked about my medical conditions, my legal case, my personal issues & even my friends & families issues, I am left wondering if I have handed my legal case over to the private investigators.
So the mention of paranoia? Yep, that’s right. Im now walking around my house, whispering to my son, whispering to my friends & family who come & help care for me. As soon as I wake, Im looking out my windows to see if ‘they’ are there. I havent seen them for more than 6 mths, but now that things are happening, they have appeared again. My son noticed them 1 morning & with the guts of youth, preceded to cross the road & approach the dark windowed car. Guess what? they started the car & drove off before he could reach them!
So yes, its not a nice way to live! No one in their right mind would choose this life. Not 1 cent is worth the crap we have to put up with, all because 1 day we went to work whole, but we left hurt, injured or damaged.
This is appalling. I agree that this is a severe form of bullying. This sociopathic corporate behaviour should be widely publicised and these companies should be brought to justice. Why is this allowed to happen? Again, injured workers are being treated as criminals, and yet injured workers do not have the access to food, shelter, medical treatment and legal assistance that convicted criminals do.
I remember after being sexually harassed, bullied, discriminated against and victimised in my workplace I felt paranoid for months about talking on my mobile phone in my own back yard, paranoid about talking even to my own family about my experiences in the workplace after my employer sent me “confidential” letters telling me I could not talk to ANYONE about what had happened in the workplace.
These were not “gag” clauses on settlement after conciliation, just heavy handed bullying tactics to frighten me into submission. In fact, I was too frightened to even attend any conciliation, as the pressure of the anxiety was too great. I feared for my personal safety.
To “ithurts”, how did you find out about the conversations in your house being recorded? Surely, that is criminal! That certainly is more than creepy. We need to reclaim our homes, our lives, our rights, our peace of mind and our safety.
The WorkCover Authority (VIC and all states) considers that surveillance of a claimant is a legitimate tool for management of a claim, however, the WorkCover Authority does issue of code of conduct to its investigators under which they are expected to operate. Click here for PDF document Code of Practice for Private Investigators
See article private investigators must adhere to code of conduct for more info
Beware snooping employers: lawyer
A FAIR Work Australia case, involving a transport company using private investigators to follow staff on sick leave, has sparked a warning from injury compensation lawyers.
Brisbane-based lawyer Chris Ng said the Victorian case should make injury compensation clients wary that employers might snoop on them.
He said he was not trying to help people push bogus claims but issued a caution that genuine claims could be challenged by employers or insurers if people did things that might, visibly, be at odds with their claim.
“Social media and private investigators are part of the injury compensation landscape now,” he said.
A Victorian woman lodged a complaint with Fair Work Australia against the Toll Group, claiming unfair dismissal after private investigators followed her to a supermarket while she was off on injury leave.
The complaint reportedly stemmed from the woman not advising her employers of the shopping trip when quizzed about her activities.
Ng, from Bennett and Philp Lawyer, said following employees was unusual but not unheard of.
He said the lesson to anyone on sick leave due to a workplace injury was to ensure any activities they undertook did not seem at odds with their claimed condition.
http://www.frasercoastchronicle.com.au/story/2012/07/11/beware-snooping-employers-lawyer/
I am employed by the above mentioned transport company and am currently off work whilst my claim for work related stress is being assessed.
This morning I have had a call from the very same private investigation firm wanting to come and interview me in two days time in my home. After reading the above comments I am now very anxious regarding this interview.
How can I safeguard myself against any underhand tactics by these people?