A New York firm that specializes in bringing the fun to adult parties is feeling the heat from the state’s Workers’ Compensation Board.
The fantastically named Tops In Bottoms Entertainment out of Glenville, NY, provides strippers and exotic dancers that its website brags will “make or break your party or gathering.” What it didn’t provide, according to the comp board, was workers’ comp insurance for the dancers or its other employees.
The state board requires employees who provide a service “essential to the success of the business” with workers’ compensation coverage – and those ladies would certainly seem to fit the bill.
Originally, the company was fined $128,000 for failing to provide coverage when it failed to respond to the board. That shapely figure was later negotiated down to $4,500 when the company provided evidence its coverage had only lapsed from August 2011 to February 2012.
(There’s no word yet on whether the company paid via check or dollar bills.)
It’s not the first time in Tops In Bottoms’ 20-plus year history that the company has been accused of not covering up. The company was also cited for a lapse in comp coverage from 2009 to 2010, which it settled for $11,498.25.
The violation was discovered by an automated system that alerts the board when the Department of Labor finds they have employees, but not coverage.
Tops in Bottoms also recently made headlines when a New York mom was charged with child endangerment. She hired a dancer for her son’s 16th birthday at a bowling alley, and photos later emerged online of the dancer hanging upside down from a party-goer by wrapping her legs around his shoulders.
Fortunately, that risky (risque?) maneuver appears to have not resulted in a work-related injury.
Had there been, the dancers wouldn’t even be wearing smiles. The costs of a workplace injury without insurance can put a company out of business.
As workers’ comp cases go, the fine was fairly small. The board has collected $19 million in fines last year alone. But cases involving strippers and comp do seem to go hand-in-hand.
