MOONING A FELLOW EMPLOYEE IS NOT GROSS MISCONDUCT

As you know, large employers with 20 or more employees with health insurance are required to provide health insurance to fired or terminated employees as long as the employee is not released for “gross misconduct.” The question is, what do the courts consider “gross misconduct?” It might surprise you.

In the first case, a fraud conviction is grounds for denying COBRA health care coverage. A professor was fired after the school learned that he had just plead guilty to student loan, bank and Social Security fraud. The school also discovered he had fabricated his credentials and never actually earned a bachelor’s degree. That is gross misconduct, a court says (Moore v. Williams College, D.C., Mass.).

But, according to another court, “mooning” a fellow worker is not gross misconduct. In this case, a female nurse who was fired for exposing her derriere during a dispute with a male coworker. Although this violated workplace protocol, her isolated and impulsive act wasn’t a case of gross misconduct (Stormont-Vail Health Care v. Reavis, D.C., Kan.). According to the court, she can be fired but she cannot be denied COBRA coverage and also is eligible for a 65% subsidy from the federal government of her health care premiums for up to 15 months.