These days with more and more family businesses being taken over by larger multi-national corporations, chances are the home office of your company is in another state or even another country. Often you could be working at a location thousands of miles away from where you were initially hired. There are also many professions including construction, sales and managerial positions which require weekly travel, or working at an out of town satellite office on a regular basis.
Then one day through no fault of your own, you are injured while working at a jobsite in a different state. You know your employer has workers’ compensation coverage but you aren’t clear as to where you need to file your claim. Your injuries required immediate medical attention and someone from that office sent you to a local physician, urgent care center or hospital emergency room. Now you have returned home, have a note from the first Doctor to not return to work, still need follow-up medical care and aren’t sure where to turn.
The National Commission on State Workmen’s Compensation Law mandated over 40 years ago that an injured employee should be given the right to file a workers’ compensation claim in one of three locations: the state where the injury occurred, the state where the employee was hired or the state where the bulk of the worker’s employment takes place. This can be to an injured worker’s advantage especially if one the states allows for higher compensation payments than the others.
Unfortunately in most cases this isn’t information the general public has easy access to and in order to ensure you are adequately compensated it is vital to contact the experienced legal professionals at Dan Pruitt Law Firm as soon as possible. Licensed to practice in several other states, Pruitt also has outstanding professional relationships with legal colleagues throughout the rest of the country. The last thing you want is to lose out on benefits and financial compensation simply because you don’t know your legal rights.
In addition to perhaps not filing in the state which provides the maximum benefits, many injured workers also make some of these additional mistakes:
• Most states require an injured employee notify their employer within a certain time period; in South Carolina it must be done within 90 days. Don’t just assume your employer knows about the injury simply because it happened on the job especially if it occurred while you were out of town or at a remote job site.
• Using your own personal health insurance to cover the cost of your injury rather than filing a claim is never a good idea due to deductibles and other out of pocket expenses.
• Erroneously assuming you don’t have a claim because of the nature of the injury. For example, while walking through the employee parking lot you slip, injuring your ankle. Or perhaps you were involved in an automobile accident on the way to your weekly satellite job site. Both of these are legitimate workers’ compensation claims.
These are just a few of several common scenarios which show why it’s so important to contact an experienced workers’ compensation attorney as soon as you’ve been injured. Dealing with medical concerns can be daunting, especially when you possibly are unable to work and are worried about providing for your family. The caring professionals here at Dan Pruitt Law Firm will be with you every step of the way, making sure you are adequately compensated.