16 A.D.2d 715 | N.Y. App. Div. | 1962
Appeal by the employer and its carrier from a decision and award of the Workmen’s Compensation Board. On March 6, 1959 claimant, a doorman and porter at an apartment house owned by the employer, was injured while lifting a heavy box of books from a closet shelf at the request of a tenant. The occurrence of the accident and the extent of the injury are not here disputed. Appellants assert, however, that claimant was not acting in the course of his employment when the accident occurred and thus liability against them was improperly assessed. The record reveals that claimant’s prescribed duties consisted of opening and closing the outside door, cleaning and polishing brass, sweeping and mopping the hall floor, and late each night collecting and removing the garbage from the hallway on each of the 15 floors of the apartment house. Claimant testified he had been instructed to assist the tenants and to show them courtesy. He testified that he often got requests to do odd jobs for tenants and that he would ask permission of his employer which was invariably granted. He acknowledged not having asked for or received explicit permission for the book moving job, but went ahead with it on the basis of prior permissions and the knowledge that it was part of his job to be courteous to tenants. He said he had never been told of a rule against helping tenants. The building superintendent substantiated much of claimant’s story. He never objected if the employees could
