The company I work for wanted me to sign legal documents that I would take personal liability if a client was harmed.

Anonymous

October 24,2021 at 12:56AM UTC

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The company I work for wanted me to sign legal documents that I would take personal liability if a client was harmed. I ran the documents past a lawyer and they said no way, that opens me up to all kinds of lawsuits, so I didn't sign them. Is this common, to require an employee to sign a document stating that they will take personal responsibility for a client if said client has a heart attack, or gets injured?

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AnonymousOctober 24,2021 at 2:11AM UTC
What is your profession? What risks do the clients face?
Normally a company and medical practitioners carry liability insurance that covers their medical services. But without more information I don't have context for advice .
AnonymousOctober 27,2021 at 2:37PM UTC
I work for a medically integrated gym inside a hospital. We get patrons who are totally healthy, and then we get patrons who are in rehabilitation. I'm in a very menial role while I go to school full time, but that role puts me as the only person in the locker room most of the time. It's common for an elderly patron to need assistance tying their shoes, for instance, or to have to call the squad for someone whose blood sugar dropped too low after a workout. That probably happens once a week.
diane lokononOctober 24,2021 at 4:13AM UTC
oh boy!
AnonymousOctober 24,2021 at 5:54AM UTC
Run!!!!!
AnonymousOctober 24,2021 at 1:40PM UTC
Absolutely not!!! As an insurance agent I can tell you most states have laws that require businesses to carry liability insurance. Employees fall under that liability coverage. If they are telling you to start your own LLC and carry your own liability insurance then they may be trying to get out of any kind of liability, including workman’s comp coverage. I see this quite often down in
South Florida. Absolutely do not take the job.
AnonymousOctober 27,2021 at 2:17PM UTC
It was very similiar to that, yes, and included a bunch of clauses about getting our own insurance. Thank you for explaining that, I can now see more of the motive.
AnonymousOctober 24,2021 at 2:27PM UTC
I've never come across that. That is extremely dangerous. You were smart to have a lawyer look at them and not sign them.
AnonymousOctober 24,2021 at 2:39PM UTC
Run.
AnonymousOctober 27,2021 at 2:27PM UTC
Well that was my first question to myself when I saw it, LOL. I work in a secondary business inside a hospital. In my position, someone has to call the squad about once a month, because there is no one else in the spaces that I work in to do so, and the patrons have trouble managing their blood sugar or heart rate or whatever. It's gotten much worse since COVID because my company pays very little and thus, no one with any sense works there any more. (I include msyelf in this category.) The form was new after we re-opened after COVID furlough.
GeralimOctober 20,2022 at 11:21AM UTC
Some time ago I was looking for a way to sign documents remotely, because it would save me a lot of time, and I found a great option in the form of software from Pandadoc at this link https://www.pdfplatform.com/split. I can really recommend this tool if you need to split a pdf file into several pages , and when you create a free account, you can sign documents.