He worked just 21 days before the fall, yet the absent employer still had to pay
A teenage labourer who worked barely a month before a fall won over HK$312,000 on 22 June 2026, Deputy District Judge Ebony Ling ruled.
The case arose from an accident on 15 September 2023, when the worker, employed by a logistics company as a labourer, slipped and fell from the top of a cargo and injured his back.
He had started with the company on 16 August 2023, less than a month before the fall. He was paid in cash at a daily rate of HK$1,300, and by the date of the accident he had worked 21 days. The judge accepted that, but for the accident, he would have completed 22 working days in his first month. That produced monthly earnings of HK$28,600 for the purposes of the Employees' Compensation Ordinance.
The worker brought his claim under sections 9, 10 and 10A of the Ordinance. The employer never engaged. It took no part in the proceedings, and interlocutory judgment was entered against it on 25 July 2025. A second respondent had been dropped from the action earlier that year. What remained for the court was simply to assess how much the absent employer owed.
Two pieces of evidence carried the assessment. First, a compensation board had certified the worker's permanent loss of earning capacity at 0.5% and confirmed that 416 days of sick leave were necessary because of the injury. Under the Ordinance, that certificate "shall be evidence of the matters stated therein," meaning the court...
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