Originally Posted by
slawecki
why not take pouring coffee out of their job description. could get a burn. take out pulling off those coke tabs, bad cut and infection. no go into toilet, could contract infection. do not roll carts, could slip and get run over. stop hanging outterware for first class passengers. break cameras and computers? why are not all in checked luggage claimed? they do open and close the front door, and it is heavy. they pick up those food trays and move them from the heater to the cart. burns and back injuries.
bus drivers load the bus. cab drivers load the cab. if services are not in their contracts, it should be. very low wages certainly are.
i carried liability insurance for my nurses. i thought back injuries from lifting patients would be the big claim. wrong. biggest claim is nurses sticking themselves with patient needles. nurses should never touch needles???
by the way galley wench, you are confusing personal med ins with company liability ins. i also do not understand a med insurance policy that would exclude you on a layover, unless you are under company control, and being paid at the time. if on the bus, and you get ill, or stand up and bang your head, i certainly would not think that excluded. bus crashes, bus insurance supersedes.
what is a FA anyway? a safety engineer
I guess the answer is that if required to lift luggage, they would do as many EU airlines have done, and cap the weight at a much lower limit (say, 7kg as some do, or 10kg as is widely applied). On balance, I think that would annoy more passengers than the FAs not helping with the luggage. BA explicitly states that passengers must be able to lift the bag themselves, not sure if other airlines do.
They mitigate most of the other risks you have mentioned (i.e. the water for tea and coffee doesn't reach boiling point, they have a decvice to open canned drinks, procedures to ensure two people move heavy carts, so it doesn't slip from one person's grasp, protective clothing and gloves for cleaning the washroom, protective clothing when dealing with the ovens, etc)
In terms of insurance, I don't know the wording of the contracts / state laws, but I do know that injuries in Canada, for example, while working, look at the action being performed, and in some cases, if the staff were specifically told not to do it (i.e. lift luggage) and injure themselves doing so, they would not be entitled to anything from the company - what that could mean is no paid sick leave while they recover, the company not paying for necessary treatment (e.g. physiotherapy), them being laid off / changed to other duties (and lose a hefty portion of their salary) because they are unable to perform the duties, in the short or long term. FAs are paid a very low salary - I don't think I would ask them to risk what livelihood they have because I don't want to check my bag.
Cab drivers are not required to help with luggage, nor are most bus drivers (the exception would be where they are required to assist someone who is registered disabled, but even in those cases I believe they can refuse if it would harm them (e.g. if the cab driver had a hernia)).
The fact is, many cab drivers, and bus drivers, and FAs will help - I've seen plenty of FAs help stow babies change bags, an elderly person's bag, a child's knapsack. What I don't expect them to do is act as a porter and schlep everyone's bags. Most people can heft a bag up - but most people couldn't heft up 150 people's heavy bags, or even 50 people's bags - it isn't always a one-off bag that can injure, but repetitive awkward lifting certainly can (as can a bad lift, of a very heavy bag too).