£1,900 win for Back pain from lifting bag that was too heavy

[POSTMAN]

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A postal worker and Communication Workers Union (CWU) member from Essex, was delivering 6 bags of mail when she suffered a back injury.



Back pain from workplace accident

As she bent her knees to pick up 1 of the heavy bags, she suffered a sharp pain in her back. A medical examination revealed that she had sustained soft tissue injuries to the lower part of her back.

She had to take a week off work with back pain and therefore lost out on her earnings.

As a result of the accident she suffered from regular pain and had to take painkillers. She also found it uncomfortable to lift or bathe her young daughter - and required assistance from her husband. To ease this pain she had 3 courses of osteopathy, which involved acupuncture and manipulation.


Lifting heavy bags at work

On the worker's behalf we wrote to her employer, Royal Mail, alleging that they were responsible for her accident.

Although she had packed the bags herself, the worker had received no proper training. Also, as there were no scales at the site where the accident happened, she had no idea whether the weights of the items she had to carry were over the recommended limits.

The postal worker did not receive any manual handling training until after her accident, at which time scales were also installed.

Based on medical evidence and our negotiations, we were able to achieve a £1,900 compensation win for the postal worker.

[Lounge Lizard]

"She had to take a week off work with back pain and therefore lost out on her earnings." No sick pay ?

[TrueBlueTerrier]

"She had to take a week off work with back pain and therefore lost out on her earnings." No sick pay ?

Probably correct, reading between the lines, it sounds like she was a new starter and would have done less than a year.