What Does Workers’ Compensation Cover?

Criminal Lawyer

If you were recently injured while working, you might have a few questions regarding workers’ compensation. It can be a complicated issue if you’re not familiar with how it works, but your lawyer can help you understand the details. Wondering what workers’ comp covers?

Medical Costs

After being injured, you’re going to have some medical expenses, as a workers compensation lawyer, like from The Law Offices of Mark T. Hurt, can explain. This could include an ambulance ride, a visit to the ER, doctor fees, surgeries and prescription medication. It could also include things such as physical therapy, follow up visits and medical supplies. Workers’ compensation should pay for all or a portion of those costs incurred to cover your medical needs.

Missed Work

While payments for medical expenses are paid from day one, missed days at work are only covered if there are more than seven days. When you hit the eighth day, you begin to collect lost wages. If you hit day 14, you will receive retroactive payments for the seven days in the beginning. If you miss seven days or less, you won’t receive compensation for missed work.

If you are out of work for an extended period of time, there may be other income you can recover. For example, if every employee is required to take a certain paid holiday off, and you are out of work recovering during that time, you could receive that pay for the holiday. You typically cannot take vacation or sick pay while receiving workers’ compensation, however.

Funeral and Burial Expenses

If your loved one died as a result of workplace injuries, workers’ compensation could help you cover funeral and burial expenses. The death would have to be a direct result of the workplace injury. For example, perhaps your loved one was crushed by a machine at work, and doctors did everything possible to save him or her, only to have the individual die three days later. You could have help with funeral and burial expenses. If your injured loved one was on his or her way home from an appointment related to the workplace injury and was hit by a car, which resulted in death, you would not be entitled to workers’ comp for funeral and burial costs.

Illnesses

In some cases, the worker doesn’t get injured, but becomes ill instead. If you are exposed to harmful chemicals or allergens that have caused you to sustain an illness, you could receive workers’ compensation to cover the costs associated with treatment and care.

Getting Your Lawyer Involved

Not every workers’ compensation case runs as smoothly as you might imagine. Whether you’re having trouble, or are just getting started, get a lawyer involved by contacting a workers’ compensation lawyer today.