The Short Answer
Whether you can collect workers' compensation for a parking lot injury depends on two key factors: whether the parking lot was owned or controlled by your employer, and whether you were injured during the course and scope of your employment. If you were clocking in, clocking out, or performing a job duty at the time of injury, you likely have a valid claim. But if you were on your own time — even if you were standing on your employer's property — the injury probably won't be covered. The phrase "course and scope of employment" is what makes or breaks these cases.
Generally speaking, it may be difficult to receive a workers’ compensation benefits if you are injured in your employer’s parking lot. However, there are some exceptions. There are several conditions that must be met for you to receive workers’ compensation benefits for an injury that occurred in your employer’s parking lot.
If you are injured during the course and scope of your employment, in other words, if you are doing your job and are injured in the parking lot of your employer or any parking lot, the injury is compensable. This may be true even as you are walking from your car to the building or from the building to your car. The key factor here is the wording “during the course and scope of your employment.”
Second, normally the parking lot must be owned, possessed, or controlled by the employer. If this is not the case, and you were not performing your job, the injury is usually not compensable. What if you were across the street in an adjacent parking lot which was not controlled by your employer immediately before work? You slipped and fell on the adjacent parking lot before you entered the premises of your employer. This injury is usually not compensable.
The term “during the course and scope of employment” is essential in receiving workers’ compensation benefits. This is true even if an accident occurred in the parking lot of your employer.
For example, on your day off you bring your friends to your employer’s ice covered parking lot. You decide to show them your potential Olympic ice skating skills. You slip on the ice and break your leg. Is this a compensable injury? Probably not. Why not? Because you were not performing your job. It was your day off and the ice skating skills you were showing your friends had nothing to do with your job duties. The injury was not in the course and scope of your employment, even though it happened on your employer’s parking lot.
However, if your employer told you (as part of your job duties) to take some potential customers to the parking lot and impress them with your skating skills as a marketing gimmick for the employer, the injury would probably be compensable.
If you believe you have suffered an injury in the parking lot of your place of employment that you should be able to recover for under workers’ compensation, contact an attorney immediately to discuss the specifics of your case.
Key Takeaways
- Injuries in an employer's parking lot are compensable only if you were acting within the course and scope of your employment at the time.
- The parking lot generally must be owned, possessed, or controlled by your employer for a claim to succeed.
- Walking to or from your car as part of your normal commute to work may qualify if it occurs on employer-controlled property.
- Being on your employer's property on your day off — for personal reasons — almost certainly does not make an injury compensable.
- If your employer directed you to perform a task in the parking lot, any injury during that task is likely covered regardless of how unusual the task seems.
- Contact a workers' compensation attorney immediately after a parking lot injury to evaluate whether the specific facts of your case support a claim.
Attorney Insight
The case I see people get wrong most often is the commute assumption — they think because they were hurt on their employer's property, they're automatically covered. That's not how North Carolina workers' comp works. What I tell clients is this: if your employer didn't control the lot and you weren't performing a work duty, the insurance carrier will deny the claim fast. Getting an attorney involved early — before you give a recorded statement — can be the difference between a paid claim and a denied one.
