Are you aware that as of November 2020, Domestic Workers and Gardeners are also covered under the Compensation for Occupational Injury and Disease Act. Employers must therefore ensure that they register with the Compensation fund.
Benefits of registering Domestic employees with the compensation fund:
- Compensation to be afforded to domestic workers for occupational injuries and diseases comprises the same benefits payable to all other injured employees. Categories thereof include:
- Temporary total disablement (where an employee is booked off for 4 months or more, with a maximum period of 24 months payable);
- Permanent disablement lump sum;
- Permanent disablement pension.
- Compensation payable to the dependants of Domestic employees who died as a result of injury on duty or occupational disease includes the following:
- Funeral expenses;
- Widow’s lump sum award;
- Widow’s pension award;
- Child pension award;
- Partial dependency award;
- Wholly dependency award.
- Compensation for orthotics and rehabilitation includes benefits such as bursaries for youth tertiary studies, rehabilitation to return to work, and cover for assistive devices needed during rehabilitation.
- Medical benefits include medical claims and claims for chronic medication.
Possible difficulties by not registering with the Compensation fund
- If your Domestic Worker gets injured on duty, the treating doctor or hospital will believe they cannot claim from the Compensation Fund and will demand payment from you.
- If you do pay medical costs on behalf of your injured Domestic Worker, you won’t be able to claim back payment from the Compensation Fund;
- If you get caught out, you can be assessed retrospectively and the relatively small amounts that you would have paid every year, will accumulate and attract interest.