This came up in Kirschenbaum's newsletter today, to which Kirschenbaum replied:
no, you can't require the employee to pay for the damage. But the good news is you can fire the employee for violation terms of employment.
I am curious how often does that come up for your techs. Last year, I saw a Simplex tech driving a Simplex van for over a mile and the whole time he had his head down texting. It was simultaneously highly dangerous and impressively stupid.
Has anyone had company vehicles damaged by such negligence?