In June, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine signed a first-of-its-kind bill into law, House Bill 477.  The bill brought about a long-anticipated amendment to Ohio law, dealing with eligibility for workers' compensation benefits when an employee is working from home. The bill is effective on September 23, 2022.

The Ohio Revised Code §4123.01 provides that, subject to certain exceptions, an employee's injury is compensable in the Ohio workers' compensation system when that injury was suffered in the course of, and arising out of, the injured person's employment. Up until September 23, 2022 and the enactment of H.B. 447, the section highlights four exclusions for injuries that may otherwise be compensable under workers' compensation when sustained in the course of, and arising out of, employment:

• Psychiatric conditions except where the claimant's psychiatric conditions have arisen from an injury or occupational disease sustained by that claimant or where the claimant's psychiatric conditions have arisen from sexual conduct in which the claimant was forced by threat of physical harm to engage or participate
• Injury or disability caused primarily by the natural deterioration of tissue, an organ, or part of the body.
• Injury or disability incurred in voluntary participation in an employer-sponsored recreation or fitness activity if the employee signs a waiver of the employee's right to compensation or benefits under this chapter prior to engaging in the recreation or fitness activity;
• A condition that pre-existed an injury unless that pre-existing condition is substantially aggravated by the injury. Such a substantial aggravation must be documented by objective diagnostic findings, objective clinical findings, or objective test results. Subjective complaints may be evidence of such a substantial aggravation. However, subjective complaints without objective diagnostic findings, objective clinical findings, or objective test results are insufficient to substantiate a substantial aggravation. 

House Bill 447 adds a fifth exclusion to the definition of "injury" for an "[i]injury or disability sustained by an employee who performs the employee's duties in a work area that is located within the employee's home and that is separate and distinct from the location of the employer[.]"  That being said, the bill does permit workers' comp coverage of an injury or disability sustained at home if:

1. The employee's injury or disability arises out of the employee's employment;
2. The employee's injury or disability was caused by a special hazard of the employee's employment activity; and
3. The employee's injury or disability is sustained in the course of an activity undertaken by the employee for the exclusive benefit of the employer.

Before H.B 447, injuries sustained in the course of and arising out of employment when working from home and injuries sustained at the employer's workplace were treated in the same way from a workers' compensation compensability context. The bill limits compensability for work-from-home injuries so that a work-from-home injury will only be compensable if it occurred "in the course of activity undertaken by the employee for the exclusive benefit of the employer" and was caused by a "special hazard" of the employee's employment activity.