Articles Posted in Workers Comp

If you suffer an injury while you are doing your job, you may be entitled to receive work injury benefits. You’ll need to take certain steps after the injury in order to make certain that you protect your rights to get benefits. Since many employees are not allowed to file a lawsuit against an employer under Georgia’s workers’ compensation rules, it is important that you understand the process of getting work injury benefits so you will be able to recover the money you need to avoid serious financial loss when an injury occurs.

An Atlanta work injury lawyer can help you to take the right steps after getting hurt on-the-job so you can obtain the benefits that the law says you’re entitled to if you get hurt while performing work tasks.

If you can make a successful workers’ compensation claim, you should be entitled to get your medical bills paid and should be entitled to get disability income though workers’ comp as well. Contact an attorney to guide you though the process of what you need to do after getting hurt.

If you are an employee at a company that is facing financial problems, you could face a greater risk of getting hurt at work. Studies have identified a link between the financial health of a business and the safety of employees of the company. While employers should always prioritize the safety of their workers, regardless of whether the company is financially struggling or not, this is not always what occurs.

If you get hurt at work, you have rights. Your employer is required to carry workers’ compensation insurance coverage, unless your employer is self-insured. This means that even if the company you work for is struggling financially, you should still be fully compensated for any work injuries. It also means workers’ comp death benefits should be available to families after fatal injuries happen. An Atlanta work accident lawyer should be consulted to get help pursuing your claim if you were harmed.

Risks of Atlanta Work Injury Rise at Financially Troubled Companies

Immediately after experiencing an accident at work, you need to go to a doctor and have a comprehensive medical exam. It is important that you do this even if you think that your injuries were not that bad or if you believe that you just got a few bumps and bruises. When you go to see a doctor, you need to report every single symptom you are experiencing and make sure that your physician documents all of the potential damage to your body and health that the workplace accident may have caused.

The reason it is so important to keep careful medical records is because you need to ensure you can prove that you sustained work-related injuries in order to make a workers’ comp claim. Workers’ compensation provides very broad protection and you do not even need to show your employer did anything wrong to get benefits. However, you do need to make sure you can show that the injuries that you need treatment for (and that are causing you to miss work) can be directly tied to harm you experienced on-the-job. An Atlanta workers’ compensation lawyer can help you to make a work injury claim and prove your physical damages are job-related.

Documenting Atlanta Work Injuries is Key to Workers’ Comp Claims

When regulations promulgated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) are violated, the risk of Atlanta work injuries is significantly higher. Employers should follow OSHA rules, but often fail to do so. Employers may disregard worker safety rules because they know OSHA inspections do not occur frequently and because they know penalties are relatively low, even for serious violations. Now, however, employers could soon face significantly higher fines when they increase work injury risks by failing to follow safety rules.

Whether an employer actually obeys OSHA regulations is not a factor in whether an injured worker can obtain workers’ compensation benefits. All employees who prove an illness or injury is due to work tasks should be able to recover benefits with the help of Atlanta workers’ compensation attorneys. Still, employees are better off if injuries do not occur in the first place. With higher OSHA fines, employers should have more incentive to implement effective safety precautions and procedures and hopefully workplace accidents and deaths will decline as a result.

Employers Could Face Higher Fines For Putting Atlanta Workers at Risk of Injury

Employees who sustain on-the-job injuries should feel comfortable reporting those injuries and seeking workers’ compensation benefits. Workers should not ever need to worry about being retaliated against by an employer for reports of their injury or for pursuing a claim for the benefits that they deserve.

When an employer takes adverse employment action against a worker because the worker has reported injuries, this is illegal under Georgia law. An Atlanta workers’ compensation attorney at Van Sant Law, LLC can provide assistance to workers in getting their injury benefits and in pursuing a claim for additional compensation if they were the victim of retaliation on the part of an employer.

Employers Face Serious Consequences for Retaliation Against Workers

Workers’ compensation benefits provide very important protection to employees. An injured worker who is covered by workers’ compensation can count on the fact he will have his medical costs paid and that he will receive income if he is too disabled to work. Because employees don’t have to prove negligence in workers’ comp cases, it is easier for injured workers to get workers’ comp and employees are eligible for benefits in cases where they couldn’t make a successful personal injury claim.

Despite these advantages of workers’ comp, the downside is that employee’s cannot sue their employers. They can, however, file civil lawsuits against non-employer third parties.

One recent lawsuit in which a worker was awarded $15 million shows the importance of exploring the possibility of third-party claims. An Atlanta workers’ compensation lawyer can help those who got hurt to explore all possible opportunities for filing suit after a serious injury.

Atlanta construction injuries are a serious risk for anyone within the construction field. Construction workers encounter many dangerous conditions on worksites, from heavy equipment and machinery to jobs which must be done at high elevations. Understanding the possible risks construction workers face is important to taking adequate safety precautions and preventing unnecessary harm.

Not all construction jobs are created equal, and some construction workers face higher risks of different kinds of illnesses and injuries than others. Roofing is one example of a construction job where employees could face both the risk of illness and the risk of serious and sometimes fatal injuries.

If you work in roofing, you need to understand the unique dangers that your profession creates and you need to understand your rights in case something goes wrong. An Atlanta workers’ compensation lawyer can provide representation in situations where you are hurt while doing roofing work, so give us a call as soon as you have suffered an injury.

There are more than 3.7 million employees working within the state of Georgia. These workers are supposed to be protected by the Occupational Safety and Health Act, which sets minimum rules for worker safety. Labor inspectors have the job of visiting workplaces in the state and making sure that there are no violations that could result in worker injury or death.

Unfortunately, according to an AFL-CIO report called Death on the Job: The Toll of Neglect, there are just 50 OSHA inspectors in the state despite the fact that there should be 379 inspectors to meet minimum benchmarks. With so few inspectors, the risk of an OSHA investigator showing up may not be enough to deter employers from allowing OSHA violations to occur on worksites.

More criminal prosecutions could make a difference by acting as an effective deterrent for rule violators, and Safety News Alert indicates that OSHA is making a major effort to step up prosecutions. Unfortunately, unless or until this effort pans out, there is simply not enough being done to protect workers from death on the job. If a death does occur, the family of the victim should consult with an Atlanta workers’ comp lawyer right away for help.

It is relatively rare for an executive to face criminal prosecution for workplace safety violations, even when workers are badly hurt or die due to the safety lapse. Although it is unusual, it does occur sometimes. Recently, the CEO of a coal company was sentenced to a year imprisonment as well as to a fine of $250,000 and an additional year of supervision. Safety advocates, however, believe the leniency of the sentence the CEO faced€“ coupled with the rarity of prosecutions like this one€“ make the threat of criminal prosecution an ineffective deterrent for bad behavior on the part of employers.

Employers need to have strong incentive to make workplaces as safe as possible, since thousands of workers continue to suffer injuries and fatalities each year on-the-job. When you are hurt at work or someone you love dies while performing work tasks, contact an Atlanta workers’ compensation lawyer to get the help you need recovering benefits for losses.

Can Criminal Charges Prevent Atlanta Workplace Safety Violations?

Keeping track of workers who are injured on-the-job is important. Employers need to report some injuries to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, and in fact the OSHA reporting requirements have recently changed to require more incidents to be reported than in the past. Companies also need to keep their own internal records of problems both to make requested information available to OSHA and to identify areas for improvement.

Unfortunately, a recent study has revealed that as many as 90 percent of companies are not living up to the record keeping rules. If these companies can’t even properly keep track of people getting hurt on-the-job, this is a bad sign regarding how seriously they take protecting their workers.

Unfortunately, workers who are hurt on-the-job generally can’t sue their employers even if violations occurred because workers’ comp laws limit recovery.