When home becomes a work problem [WATCH]

A fall down the stairs, a road crash or even a cat bite can take a worker away from the job - and expose how an accident outside the workplace can still hit the household's finances, writes Intan

Maizura Ahmad Kamal

For most workers, a workplace accident is easy enough to picture: a fall at a construction site, an injury involving machinery, a collision while making a delivery. But some accidents happen nowhere near the workplace and can still follow a worker straight back to it.

A fall down the stairs at home, an injury on a hiking trail or even a cat bite may have nothing to do with the job, yet any of them can leave a worker unable to work, with an empty chair at the workplace and a household suddenly having to cope without its usual income.

That's the gap Malaysia's LINDUNG 24 Jam scheme is designed to address: what happens when an accident unrelated to a person's job leaves them temporarily unable to work.

In its first three months, Perkeso recorded 6,330 claims under the scheme, with RM9.97 million in benefits paid out.

Because when a worker cannot work, the distinction between where an accident happened and where its consequences are felt can become rather academic.

An Ordinary Day Goes Wrong

Some of the cases highlighted by Perkeso show just how far removed an accident can be from the conventional idea of workplace risk: a young worker in Sabah who fell down a staircase at home, another injured while hiking and a veterinary assistant seriously hurt by a cat bite. Other claims involved road accidents and incidents during workers' personal time.

Yet the common thread wasn't where the accident happened, but what followed: a worker suddenly unable to do the job that provides an income.

The first three months of claims also point to who may have the least room to absorb such a disruption: workers earning below RM3,500 accounted for 74 per cent of all claims, according to Perkeso.

Edmund Cheong Peck Huang, Perkeso's deputy chief executive (Strategy and Corporate Social Security Organisation), said the high proportion highlighted the financial vulnerability of lower- income workers when an accident takes them out of the workforce.

"For a lower-income worker, being unable to work for even two or three months due to an injury isn't just a temporary inconvenience. It immediately threatens family survival."

In July alone, applications rose to 2,135 from 616 in June, while RM3.45 million in benefits was paid to 2,508 recipients. More than 90 per cent of claims were processed and approved within five days.

Rent still has to be paid, children still need to get to school, groceries still have to be bought and loan repayments continue to fall due.

The Risk We Don't See

The numbers also reveal a more complicated picture.

As of September, 8.5 million workers, or 87.6 per cent, remained enrolled in LINDUNG 24 Jam, while about 1.2 million, or 12.4 per cent, had opted out. Of those who left, 52 per cent earned below

RM3,500.

The figures alone don't explain why individual workers chose to opt out, and income cannot be assumed to be the reason. But Perkeso said it has identified an awareness and perception gap around the scheme.

For some workers, Cheong said, the monthly contribution can feel like another deduction from their pay rather than protection against a risk they may never have to face.

Then there's the familiar thought: it won't happen to me.

For workers who are healthy and active, an off-work accident can seem like a distant possibility until it isn't. Some also continue to associate Perkeso protection mainly with accidents at the workplace or while commuting, and may not realise that LINDUNG 24 Jam extends to qualifying accidents outside working hours and unrelated to employment.

Others, he added, believe the claims process is complicated, rigid or slow. The challenge, ultimately, is a familiar one: getting people to think about the risk while it's still only a possibility, rather than after it has become a problem.

What The Claims Revealed

The first three months have also given Perkeso a clearer picture of the risks workers face outside the workplace. Cheong said what stood out was the "sheer volume and everyday nature" of hazards that had previously been less visible within the social security framework.

Claims have involved routine domestic and recreational activities, including falls from ladders during home renovations, serious cat bites, weekend sports injuries and road accidents during personal travel.

The overall volume rose sharply, from an average of about 16 claims a day in June to roughly 69 a day by August - more than four times higher. The experience reinforced Perkeso's view that risks don't stop when workers clock out.

Formal-sector workers spend roughly 33 per cent of their time working, including commuting, meaning about 67 per cent of their time is spent outside working hours.

The point isn't that every minute outside work carries the same level of risk. It's that a worker remains a worker - with bills, dependants and earning responsibilities - even when an accident occurs somewhere that has nothing to do with the job.

When Workers Return

By September, about 10,000 workers who'd previously opted out had returned to LINDUNG 24 Jam.

Cheong said Perkeso had found that greater awareness of risk was a key reason workers returned to the scheme.

He pointed to cases in which workers had opted out and subsequently suffered non-work injuries,

only to find they weren't eligible for LINDUNG 24 Jam benefits because they were no longer participating.

Such cases, he said, had served as "eye-openers" within communities.

The increase in reported claims, together with a simplified online re-entry process, also gave workers a way to reconsider their decision.

It's difficult to know what prompted each individual worker to return. But the broader pattern is revealing: protection that can feel unnecessary when nothing has happened can look rather different after something does.

Safety Net With Limits

LINDUNG 24 Jam isn't intended to cover every illness or situation. It applies to eligible employees for qualifying accidents occurring outside working hours and unrelated to employment, subject to the applicable conditions.

Participation for local employees is voluntary, with the worker bearing the contribution. The contribution rate is implemented in phases, starting at 0.75 per cent, rising to 1 per cent for years three to five and 1.25 per cent from the sixth year onwards.

Cheong said another misconception PERKESO encounters is the idea that social security works like an individual savings account, with contributions accumulating for personal withdrawal. Instead, he explained, PERKESO operates on the principle of social solidarity and risk pooling, with contributions supporting a collective social security system.

In other words, the scheme isn't a promise that nothing will go wrong. It's an attempt to provide protection for what happens when something does.

Accidents And Consequences

A staircase at home may have nothing to do with a person's occupation, just as a hiking trail or a road outside working hours may have nothing to do with the job listed on a payslip.

But if an injury means that person cannot stand behind a counter, operate machinery, drive a vehicle, lift goods, work a shift or simply turn up for work, the boundary between a private accident and a workplace problem becomes considerably less clear.

The workplace is where a person earns a living, but it's only one part of the life that income supports. It pays for food and the roof overhead, household bills, transport, rent and the countless ordinary expenses that continue regardless of where an accident happened.

That's ultimately what the 6,330 claims represent: ordinary working lives interrupted by something that happened outside the workplace.

For a worker who's suddenly unable to earn, an accident at home can become a work problem very quickly; the place where the injury happens may be private, but the consequences rarely are.