Why is the court still ruling that the company needs to compensate 900000 yuan after encountering a work-related injury? Workers promise to pay work-related injury insurance and other work on their own | Crew | Court
June 25th is the 13th World Seafarers Day, and the Shanghai Higher People's Court will report on the work of serving and protecting the rights and interests of crew members, and release typical cases.
From 2018 to 2022, Shanghai courts accepted a total of 1137 first instance cases involving crew labor and maritime special procedures involving crew members, with 1197 cases concluded and a total amount of 145 million yuan involved; Accepted 482 cases involving crew members in execution, with a target amount of over 38.55 million yuan fully executed; The main types of disputes in the collection of cases are concentrated in crew salary and compensation, as well as crew personal injury and death, with crew salary and compensation disputes accounting for 87.7%.
Due to the high mobility and employment flexibility of crew members, in the shipping market, in addition to traditional labor contracts signed by crew members, there are also labor dispatch relationships and free crew members who do not sign labor contracts with any unit. This involves various relationships such as employers, employers, dispatch units, intermediary agencies, ship owners, ship managers, ship lessees, etc. It is easy to generate significant disputes on the payment subject of wages and compensation, and the responsibility subject for crew casualties. Therefore, cases involving crew members mainly exhibit complex litigation employment relationships, obvious characteristics affected by the epidemic, multiple foreign-related connection factors, and a high first instance resolution rate.
In August 2018, Le worked as a sailor on a ship owned by the defendant Donghai Company. Both parties agree in the employment contract that Mr. Le promises to pay the housing provident fund and various social insurance benefits to the relevant local institutions on his own. Afterwards, Le died unexpectedly on board the ship, and the labor security department recognized it as a work injury. Le's wife Zhang, along with her mother and daughter, jointly filed a lawsuit with the court, demanding that Donghai Company pay over 900000 yuan in work-related injury insurance benefits and funeral expenses, as well as over 1 million yuan in compensation for supporting relatives, based on the labor contract relationship. Donghai Company believes that Mr. Le voluntarily proposed not to pay the corresponding social insurance on behalf of the company, and both parties have reached an agreement on this. Therefore, the responsibility for not being able to obtain work-related injury compensation due to not paying the work-related injury insurance premium is not on his own and should not be compensated.
After the trial by the Shanghai court, it was found that although Le had agreed with Donghai Company to pay various social insurance premiums on his own, it could not exempt the employer from the legal obligation to pay work-related injury insurance premiums in accordance with relevant laws and regulations. According to the Implementation Measures for Work Injury Insurance in Shanghai, if an employer fails to pay the required work injury insurance premiums while participating in work injury insurance, and an employee suffers a work injury during this period, the employer shall pay the fees according to the work injury insurance benefits and standards. Therefore, the court ruled in the first instance that Donghai Company should pay a one-time work-related death allowance and funeral expenses of more than 900000 yuan, and rejected the other claims of Zhang and others. In the second instance, under the auspices of the court, both parties reached a mediation agreement with a compensation amount slightly higher than the amount determined in the first instance.
It is reported that the Shanghai court has always attached great importance to the mediation and resolution of cases involving crew members. In addition to participating in the distribution of ship auction funds, which generally requires the basis of property rights judgments, a considerable number of labor disputes involving crew members in the first instance have been resolved through mediation, settlement, and withdrawal. The case withdrawal rate accounts for about 77.2%, effectively resolving conflicts and disputes.