Many of these grievances reflect genuine distress. Yet, under the Employees’ Compensation Ordinance (Cap. 282) (“ECO”), not all stressful encounters qualify as compensable workplace injuries. The ECO distinguishes ordinary workplace pressures from a qualifying “accident” that causes a recognisable psychiatric disorder. The boundary between those categories is often where disputes arise.
Against that backdrop, the recent District Court case of Chan Man Sau v. 風采中學（教育評議會主辦）法團校董會 [2025] HKDC 1354 involved six consolidated employee compensation claims by a secondary school teacher against his employer. The alleged incidents comprise: a claimed lowerback injury attributed to an office chair, a single physical injury when the teacher’s head was cut by a protruding signage edge on a lockerroom door, and four alleged psychiatric injuries said to stem from workplace interactions and events.
“Accident” and psychiatric injury under the ECO
The court affirmed ECO section 5(1): employers are liable for “personal injury by accident arising out of and in the course of the employment.” Psychiatric claims require both an “accident” and a compensable “injury.”
For psychiatric claims, the court looked for a recognisable psychiatric disorder caused by a qualifying accident; mere stress, anxiety, or upset is not itself an injury for ECO purposes. Drawing on Yeung Yim Ngor Angela v. Po Leung Kuk No 1 W H Cheung College [2019] 5 HKLRD 515, the court emphasised that not every workplace dispute, suspension, reprimand or criticism is an “accident.” Adopting the expression “injury by accident” that the House of Lords of the United Kingdom construed in Fenton v J Thorley & Co Ltd, “accident” means “an unlookedfor mishap or an untoward event which is not expected or designed.”
Application to alleged psychiatric incidents
The Court critically examined the definition of “accident” under the ECO for psychiatric injuries. It found the employer liable for one physical injury, but dismissed all other claims of the employee including the four claims for psychiatric injury grounded in workplace interactions and events. Context was pivotal:
- A recorded conversation between the applicant and a colleague Ms Chan, during which the colleague repeatedly used phrases such as “play tricks” and “kill you”, was, in context and tone, her attempt to reassure the applicant rather than to threaten or intimidate him.
- Media coverage of separate litigation and foreseeable student reactions (including teasing and mocking comments) were not unexpected, sudden or untoward events.
- Follow-up by general office staff, the principal, and the vice-principal after a missed scheduled lesson by the applicant were ordinary routine management actions, not sudden or untoward events.
- An exchange between the assistant principal and the applicant regarding an IT password did not involve shouting or disrespect as alleged; the court preferred the evidence of the assistant principal and teacher and noted the improbability of an unreported, public outburst in an open staffroom.
These findings reflect the Yeung line of authority that normal managerial actions, even if unwelcome, do not, without more, amount to an “accident” under the ECO.
Key takeaways on psychiatric injury claims
Chan Man Sau reinforces the stringent threshold for psychiatric injury claims under the ECO, especially without physical injury.
Building on Yeung, the District Court provided a practical test for verbal conduct to amount to an “accident” causing psychiatric injury: the focus is on the manner of the exchange, not merely the fact, of criticism.
Spoken words in a workplace conversation may, in principle, form the basis for an “accident”, but only where they are untoward in context and the conversation constitutes an unexpected mishap. Ordinary managerial communications, even if unwelcome, do not constitute an “accident.” This distinguishes a single, unexpected event from cumulative workplace pressures, which generally do not meet the statutory concept of “accident”, unless the injury arises from an untoward reaction caused by the cumulative effect of a series of events.
This highlights employers’ duty of care to ensure professional communications to avoid creating such unexpected and untoward events.
The court’s approach in Chan Man Sau also illustrates practical evidential demands in psychiatric claims. A contemporaneous complaint or report, prompt medical attendance, and a clear psychiatric diagnosis materially assist in establishing both the existence of an “accident” and a compensable injury. Conversely, delayed reporting, lack of corroboration, inconsistencies over time, and tenuous mechanisms of injury can be fatal. Causation is ultimately a question for the court, assessed on a balance of probabilities with ordinary common sense. Medical experts can assist, but judges are not bound to rely on them for causation findings.
Practical implications
Chan Man Sau reaffirms Yeung’s authoritative guidance. Psychiatric injury claims under the ECO rise or fall on whether there is a specific, unexpected mishap and a recognisable psychiatric condition causally linked to it.
From a risk management perspective, employers should calibrate policies and training to reduce sudden, untoward events. This includes encouraging measured, respectful communications; ensuring fair performance management; and providing clear reporting channels. Prompt documentation of incidents is critical for later questions of “accident” and injury.
Internally, decisionmakers of the employer should methodically test three questions: (i) was there a sudden, unexpected event amounting to an accident; (ii) is there a recognisable psychiatric diagnosis; and (iii) does the totality of evidence support causation on a commonsense basis. Framing internal reviews around these questions will help organisations respond consistently and fairly while reducing exposure and potential liability.
Conclusion
Chan is a reminder that psychiatric injury can arise from workplace events and may attract employees’ compensation. It sharpens, rather than softens, the line drawn in Yeung. Psychiatric harm is compensable only where a qualifying accident, an unlookedfor mishap, causes a recognisable disorder. Routine managerial acts, foreseeable reactions to public events, and the ordinary frictions of working life do not meet that standard, even if they cause real upset.
For employers, the message is to prepare for the exceptional event, not to medicalise the everyday: design respectful management practices, train leaders to handle and manage conflicts and disputes, and record what happens when the unexpected occurs.
For employees and advisers, the pathway to ECO recovery remains clear but narrow: identify the sudden incident, secure timely medical assessment, and marshal coherent evidence of causation. The cases clarify that while genuine distress is taken seriously, the ECO’s accident requirement is a real filter: attempts to relabel ordinary discipline, performance management, or workplace tension as “accidents” will be difficult to succeed.
