On top of being painful and potentially debilitating, injuries on the job can cause significant financial and personal losses, especially if they leave someone unable to work and earn income for a period of time. Fortunately, almost every employer in Pennsylvania is legally required to maintain workers’ compensation insurance, through which employees who get hurt performing job-related tasks may seek financial compensation for certain economic losses.
Effectively complying with state regulations and maximizing your workers’ compensation claim could be much easier with guidance and support from a knowledgeable DuBois workers’ compensation lawyer. Insurance providers and employers can provide substantial opposition to recovery in some situations, and having a dedicated DuBois personal injury attorney’s representation can go a long way towards tilting the odds of a positive claim result back in your favor.
With only a handful of exceptions for certain agricultural, executive, and administrative workers, and employees who are covered under federal law rather than state law, every company that operates in Pennsylvania must purchase workers’ compensation coverage for all their full-time and part-time workers. This insurance provides a safety net for both the workers and their employer. Injured employees have access to compensation that could keep them from sustaining long-term losses from an on-the-job accident, and employers are protected from civil liability for such incidents in exchange for automatically assuming liability through their insurer for certain workers’ compensation benefits.
In a typical case, those benefits may include:
A DuBois attorney could explain what benefits might be available for a particular employee on a case-by-case basis.
Under the Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Act, codified in Title 77 of the Pennsylvania Statutes, employees who get hurt or ill while working have a maximum of 21 days after discovering the harm they sustained to report the incident to their employer. A worker who waits longer than 120 days after an injury actually occurs is generally time-barred from pursuing workers’ compensation benefits.
If an employer and injured employee can mutually agree on a fair amount of compensation, they can formalize that agreement on or after the seventh day following the injury in question. Otherwise, an injured worker has up to three years to file a workers’ compensation claim seeking further benefits. A workers’ compensation lawyer in DuBois could explain how this process works in further detail and go over what evidence may be necessary to file a comprehensive claim.
While workers’ comp provides important benefits to workers in Pennsylvania who get hurt or sick on the job, those benefits can be deceptively difficult to obtain in many cases. If your employer disagrees with you about the severity of your injuries or whether you are fit to restart work, you may need help from a knowledgeable legal professional in order to protect your rights and interests.
Fortunately, that assistance is available from a seasoned DuBois workers’ compensation lawyer. Call today to schedule a consultation at Marcus & Mack.
