Injuries Caused by Third Parties in the Workplace
Your Options When You’re Hurt by a Third Party on the Job
In New Jersey, as in all states, when you’re injured while working, your first course of action will typically be to notify your employer and file a workers’ compensation claim. The requirements to qualify for workers’ comp are pretty straightforward: you must have suffered an injury and it must have happened during the course of your employment.
But it’s important to understand that workers’ compensation is intended to address injuries caused by your employer or a co-worker. If you suffer injuries because of the carelessness or negligence of an unrelated third party, you may be able to file for workers’ compensation benefits, but you may also have the right to file a personal injury lawsuit in court. If your injuries are caused entirely by your employer or a co-worker, workers’ compensation is the only recourse available to you.
Why Might You Want to File a Personal Injury Lawsuit?
Workers’ compensation laws were enacted in an effort to simplify the process for both workers and employers. As a worker, if your claim is approved, you can start receiving payments within a couple of weeks. Furthermore, as stated above, you don’t have to prove that your employer acted negligently or carelessly. Your injury must simply be work-related.
In a personal injury lawsuit, you will have to establish that the defendant (your employer or another party) was legally negligent. In addition, when you file a personal injury lawsuit, you can expect that, unless you settle before trial, it will be months and possibly years before your case is resolved (and before you receive any type of damage award).
The primary reason for filing a personal injury lawsuit is that you won’t be limited to the benefits available through a workers’ comp claim. The amount you receive through workers’ compensation is based on a specific formula, taking your recent wages into account. As a general rule, if you are fully disabled by your injury, you have the right to recover up to 70% of your average weekly wage. In a personal injury lawsuit, though, the jury won’t be limited to that amount and could return a significantly higher damage award. Of course, the jury may also reject your claim.
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online or call us at 201-791-1333 or 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
Happy Thanksgiving
Common Winter Workplace Injuries in New Jersey
Winter Conditions Contribute to Annual Rise in Job-Related Injuries
It’s winter in New Jersey, which means ice and snow. And if you work outside, it can mean a greater risk of injury on the job. But even if most of your work is inside, you might still be at risk. Statistics show that work-related injuries go up when the weather gets cold. What are the common causes of workplace injuries in the New Jersey winter? Can you seek workers’ compensation for winter work injuries?
What Are the Common Types of Winter Workplace Injuries?
Most winter workplace injuries fall into one of the following categories:
- Slips and falls—These may occur outside or inside, caused by an accumulation of snow or ice, or by wet floors when workers track in moisture.
- Hypothermia—Employees who are outside for extended periods of time, such as construction workers and delivery drivers, can be at risk of frostbite or hypothermia.
- Motor vehicle collisions—Delivery people, outside salespeople, and others are at risk of having accidents on slippery roads in the winter in New Jersey.
- Electrocutions—Ice and snow can take down and then obscure live power lines. The moisture caused by melting snow and ice can make the situation worse.
Can You Get Workers’ Comp Benefits for a Winter Workplace Injury?
Absolutely. In New Jersey, as in all states, there are only two requirements to qualify for workers’ compensation. You must show that you suffered an injury, and you must prove that the injury was work-related, i.e., sustained in the performance of your job. You can seek benefits for a slip and fall on icy steps, pavement, or other walkway, but you may also be able to get workers’ comp if your exposure to the weather causes pneumonia or other illness.
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online, or call us at 201-791-1333 or 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
Can You Choose Your Own Doctor When You Have a New Jersey Workers’ Comp Claim?
What Rights Do You Have With Respect to Who Treats You?
You’ve been hurt on the job, and it’s either making it difficult for you to work, or it’s preventing you from being gainfully employed. Your first concern, after any injury, is about getting the care you need so that you maximize the likelihood of full recovery. Can you simply schedule an appointment with your primary care physician, or take yourself to the hospital or urgent care facility? How much control do you have over who treats your injuries?
New Jersey Law Generally Gives the Employer the Right to Choose the Caregiver
Unlike most other states, New Jersey does not give an injured worker the right to select a doctor or other caregiver, with a few exceptions. As a general rule, the employer or the workers’ compensation insurance provider gets to select who will provide initial treatment. In the immediate aftermath of an injury, once you’ve notified your employer (who will subsequently notify the workers’ comp insurance provider), your employer will designate who you must see for treatment. You must submit to treatment by the selected doctor, either for the first 10 visits or the first 30 days, whichever is completed first. Once you’ve completed 10 visits or 30 days, you can ask the New Jersey Division of Workers’ Compensation for a change of treating physician, but there’s no right to change your doctor. You can request a second opinion, but such a request must be approved by the insurer.
General Exceptions to the Rule
Under limited circumstances, you may have the right to treatment by someone other than the doctor selected by the insurance company:
- Any care that is provided on an emergency basis
- Care for a pre-existing condition by the doctor who previously treated you
- Care by a physician approved by the workers’ compensation judge after a formal request
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online, or call us at 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
Can You get Workers’ Compensation for a Pre-Existing Injury?
Can You Qualify for Benefits If You Aggravate an Old Injury?
You’ve suffered some type of injury that prevents you from working. Maybe it happened at your current job, or maybe it happened before you came to your current employer. Maybe it wasn’t even related to your job—suppose you hurt yourself playing sports when you were younger and you aggravate that injury on the job. Can your employer or the workers’ compensation insurance company attribute your inability to work to the old injury and reject your claim for workers’ comp benefits?
Qualifying for Workers’ Compensation Benefits
In New Jersey, as in all states, there are only two requirements to be eligible for workers’ comp benefits: (1) you must suffer an injury, and (2) the injury must have been sustained during the course of your employment. So how does that apply when you have a documented pre-existing injury? It all comes down to whether the original injury is currently preventing you from currently or “an aggravation” of that prior injury. The simple fact that you were previously injured will not automatically disqualify you from eligibility for workers’ compensation benefits.
Under New Jersey law, employers take employees as they find them, with all pre-existing injuries and illnesses. There is no affirmative duty to inform an employer of a prior injury; if the employer does not ask, the employee is under no duty to disclose a previous injury. But an employee may not misrepresent the occurrence of a prior injury.
An employee will be allowed to recover workers’ compensation benefits only if they can prove that the prior injury was aggravated by their job. If it can be established that the employee never fully recovered from the prior injury, workers’ comp benefits typically will not be available. However, if the employee was cleared by a doctor to return to work and then aggravated the prior injury, benefits typically will be available.
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online, or call us at 201-791-1333 or 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
Actions to Avoid After a Workplace Injury
Mstakes That Will Put Your Claim at Risk
The New Jersey workers’ compensation laws are pretty straightforward. As in other states, you don’t have to prove that your employer’s negligence caused your workplace injury. You only need to show two things: that you were hurt and that your injury happened during the course of your employment.
It’s possible, though, for you to inadvertently put your legitimate claim in jeopardy. Here are some of the ways that you can complicate the workers’ compensation process:
Mistake #1—You Don’t Notify Your Employer in a Timely Manner
Under New Jersey law, you have 90 days to let your employer know you’ve been hurt or are suffering some work-related illness. It’s usually in your best interests to tell your employer as soon as possible, though. If you wait unnecessarily, you could suffer an injury unrelated to your employment, which could make it far more difficult to prove that your losses were related to the workplace injury.
Mistake #2—Trying to Do All the Things You Did Before Your Injury
It’s natural, after any type of injury, to want to return to normal as soon as possible. That can often lead you to do things that you shouldn’t, like mowing the lawn, shoveling sidewalks, or engaging in other physical activities. Don’t be surprised if the workers’ compensation insurance company sends a private investigator out to see what you’re doing. Pictures of you engaging in physical activity can be detrimental to your claim.
Mistake #3—Failing to Get Medical Attention
You might not want to see a doctor about your injury as part of an attempt to shake it off or prove your mettle. That won’t benefit you in a workers’ compensation case. If you don’t seek medical attention, it will look for all intents and purposes as if you weren’t injured.
Mistake #4—Trying to Handle Your Workers’ Comp Claim by Yourself
This may be the biggest mistake of all. Though a workers’ compensation claim may seem cut and dried, your employer and the workers’ comp insurer have a vested interest in paying you as little as possible. They’ll look for every opportunity to diminish or deny your claim, and they know a lot more about the workers’ comp process than you do.
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online, or call us at 201-791-1333 or 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
Was Your Injury Work-Related?—Part 3
Work Outside Scope of Duties | Injuries Suffered During Horseplay or in a Work-Related Scuffle
Under the workers’ compensation law of New Jersey, an injured worker doesn’t need to establish that the employer was negligent in order to receive benefits. Because workers’ comp is essentially based on the concept of strict liability, a person needs to show only that they suffered an injury and that the injury was work-related.
In the first two blogs in this series, we looked at injuries that occur while a worker is on a break, injuries sustained while at a company social event, and injuries suffered while traveling for work. In this part, we’ll look at two more situations: injuries that occur when you’re doing something that’s not within your job description or while fooling around with a co-worker.
Injuries Suffered While Doing Something Outside Your Job Description
Suppose you’re a machine operator, but your boss asks you to climb a ladder to retrieve a tool or some materials. If you fall off the ladder, can you still recover workers’ comp benefits?
As a general rule, if your supervisor asks you to do something outside of the normal scope of your job, any injuries suffered will be covered by workers’ compensation. Conversely, if your employer has specifically instructed you not to do something outside your job description, but you do it anyway, your claim is likely to be denied. If you’re injured while doing something that your boss neither asked you to do nor specifically prohibited you from doing, you may or may not be eligible for benefits, depending on whether or not your actions were reasonable under the circumstances.
Injuries While Engaged in Horseplay
In most instances, if you’re injured during horseplay that you initiated, your claim will be denied. On the other hand, if you are somehow hurt by the horseplay of coworkers, even though you were not involved in the horseplay yourself, you should be able to recover benefits. ‘
In some instances, even though you initiated the horseplay, you may still be eligible for benefits. The workers’ compensation board will look at a number of factors:
- How serious was the horseplay, and how long did it go on?
- Was there a practice in the particular workplace of condoning or even encouraging horseplay? Was it an accepted part of the work environment?
- Was the horseplay objectively dangerous, or well outside the scope of employment?
- Did you stop what you were doing to participate in the horseplay?
- Did the nature of the employment reasonably encourage or lead to horseplay? Did you have a lot of idle time, for example?
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online, or call us at 201-791-1333 or 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
Happy 4th of July 2024
Was Your Injury Work-Related? Part 2
Injuries Suffered While Traveling for Work
In New Jersey, as in all states, workers’ compensation benefits are available to injured workers without evidence or proof of negligence by the employer. Generally, the only requirements to qualify are evidence that you were injured and that the injury occurred while you were working.
In the first blog in this series, we looked at injuries that occur while you are on a break or at a company social event. In this part, we’ll consider your rights if you suffer an injury while traveling for your job. What if you are in a motor vehicle accident on your way to or from work or while driving to visit a customer? What if you suffer an injury while away at a work-related conference, sales meeting, or training session?
Injuries Suffered During a Commute Are Generally Not Covered by Worker’s Comp
As a general rule, injuries suffered while you are going to work at the beginning of your shift or heading home at the end of the day are not considered work-related. There are, however, some exceptions:
- If you take a detour from your normal commute to do something for your employer, at your employer’s request, and you are injured during the detour, you may be eligible for workers’ compensation benefits. For example, if your boss asks you to stop by the post office or pick up bagels for the office on your way to work, you may qualify for benefits.
- If you leave home and go directly to a customer’s office, you may also be eligible.
Injuries Sustained While Attending a Work-Related Conference, Meeting, or Training Session
Most injuries suffered at conferences, meetings, and training sessions are covered by worker’s comp, unless the activity you were engaging in was wholly personal and not related to your attendance at the event. A slip-and-fall at the hotel where a conference is being held will typically be covered. Injuries suffered in a motor vehicle accident on your way to or from a conference event will also be covered. You may even be able to recover worker’s comp for injuries suffered while away from the meeting center to get something to eat. However, injuries suffered while working out at the hotel fitness room may be deemed a wholly personal activity and not work-related.
Contact the Cintron Firm
At the Cintron Firm, LLC, we offer more than 14 years of experience to people in New Jersey facing a broad array of legal challenges. Attorney Mark Cintron has worked as a prosecutor and has extensive courtroom experience, so he’s always ready, willing, and able to protect your interests before a judge or jury. Contact our office online, or call us at 201-791-1333 or 917-494-5695 to set up an appointment.
