If you were on a construction site and suffer certain bodily injuries such as a head wound or broken leg that causes you to stay off work for some weeks or months, you are eligible to seek legal recourse. Worker’s compensation could help you to a point but hiring a construction accident attorney could make sure you get sufficiently compensated.
All the 50 states utilize certain forms of workers’ compensation that is covered under the employer’s insurance policy. Some laws limit the workers to be able to only receive workers’ compensation for injuries that occurred on the job site, removing third party claims from options.
It is possible to receive compensation from parties other than their employers in cases where the injury was not caused by job safety but by other means. If the third party was liable of providing faulty machinery, you can file a personal injury claim. Your supervisors need to provide you with information related to receive workers’ compensation coverage for you accident. It is essential that you don’t sigh a settlement offer given to you by your employer without consulting with an experienced attorney first.
It is not just the construction worker who are at risk of getting injured, non-workers can also get harmed at the sites due to falling debris, unattended machinery etc. Hence it’s the site contractor’s responsibility to make the public aware of these dangers. In some states a contractor can be held liable for any pedestrian injury if he/she fails to enforce proper safety precautions. In other states where this liability isn’t automatically assumed, the failure to provide safety can be used by the injured party as evidence that the contractor should be held responsible for their injuries.
How can an attorney help?
Employees tend to receive less payment in a workers’ compensation case than they would in a personal injury lawsuit carried forward by an experienced lawyer. Various parties could be liable for the accident beyond your basic workers’ compensation rights, depending on the kind of situation. Certain examples include:
- Coworkers could be held accountable if they were negligent in performing their duties.
- Employers could be liable if they permitted unsafe working conditions to persist.
- Manufacturers could be liable if their equipment were defective and resulted in workers getting injured.
If either one of the aforementioned party is responsible for you injuries, a third-party claim would need to be filed by an attorney to take legal action against the negligent individual. In several states, if OSHA regulation is violated resulting in an injury, the construction company is deemed at fault and is held liable for all injuries caused in the accident. The filing of a third-party claim includes following steps-
- Filing the claim
- Gathering and presenting documented evidence
- Negotiating a settlement
- Attending a trial (if necessary)
The Statute of limitation for filing such claims vary from state to state. Thus to make sure you don’t miss out on what you rightfully deserve it is crucial to complete all the above steps and determine the best course of action for you.
It is advisable to hire an attorney to guide you through the right procedures.
Originally posted 2017-07-15 01:09:22.
