NJ Workers Compensation
4 Common Workplace Injuries in the Office and Tips to Avoid Them
Offices are generally safe and secure places to work in New Jersey. Unlike construction sites and industrial warehouses, you don’t usually encounter heavy machinery or the need for strenuous manual labor, and unlike nursing or other medical professions there is limited lifting, pushing and pulling. Yet, the U.S. Bureau for Labor Statistics estimated that in the finance and insurance industries, professions that typically operate out of traditional office space, one in every 100 employees were injured at work last year.
These workplace injuries spanned a surprising range of type and severity. Yet, just as nursing is particularly prone to neck and back injuries, and falls are common to working in construction – certain workplace injuries are more common than others in offices. Office managers, human resources, and upper management can save considerable costs and improve the working environment by proactively addressing the most frequent office injuries.
#1: Slips, Trips & Falls
Across industries, slips, trips and falls account for more workplace injuries than any other cause. These unfortunate accidents require employees to take significant time off work and are a major source of workers’ compensation claims in New Jersey. This includes claims that come from office workers, who are actually 2.5 more likely to slip or trip at work than workers in any other environment or industry.
Unsuspecting office employees are victims of hidden and overlooked trip and fall hazards every day. For instance, a huge number of office employees trip on cords, cables and wiring that are stretched across …
Read MoreFor an Employee Injured at Work: Two Paths in New Jersey for Workers’ Compensation
In New Jersey, an employee injured at work should first and foremost tell an employer about the accident, incident or illness. Employers in New Jersey are required to have workers’ compensation insurance that reimburses an employee’s medical expenses and pays benefits after an injury. Once an employer knows about your injury, it has a responsibility to start the claims process with the insurance provider.
In most cases, the employer makes the appropriate phone calls to the insurance company and files the correct paperwork. The average employee injured at work in New Jersey encounters very few problems receiving workers’ compensation benefits. In these uncontested situations, an employee may ask initial questions of an attorney regarding what to tell an insurance provider, how to complete required paperwork, and what to expect throughout the process.
Employee Injured at Work & Pushback on Workers’ Compensation
Other employees receive deferment, delay and denial from their employer or the insurance provider. An employer may argue that the accident occurred outside of work or was the result of recreational activities. Some situations, such as repetitive motion injuries and cumulative trauma are harder for an employee to prove, and an insurance company may inappropriately pushback on these claims.
When an employee injured at work receives pushback or denial of a workers’ compensation claim, the New Jersey Workers’ Compensation Law provides separate paths for employees to obtain appropriate and entitled benefits.
Filing for an Informal Hearing
An employer injured at work can file with the New Jersey Department …
Read MoreNew Jersey Supreme Court to Decide Question of Jurisdiction in Workers’ Compensation Case
In New Jersey, there are several procedural and factual barriers that an injured employee must overcome to have a successful workers’ compensation claim. There include providing proper notification of an injury, filing a claim within the required period of time, and bringing a case in the state with proper jurisdiction to determine an outcome. All of these procedural requirements must be met before an injured worker even gets a hearing date.
An upcoming case before the New Jersey Supreme Court takes a look at the parameters and requirements for one of these procedural requirements – jurisdiction.
The Facts of Williams v. Raymours Furniture Co Inc
In August the New Jersey Supreme Court agreed to hear the case of Keith Williams v. Raymours Furniture Co Inc. It is a case that began when Mr. Williams accepted a job back in 2014. Williams lived in New Jersey, and it is from his home in the state that he accepted a position at a warehouse in Suffern, New York. This is where Mr. Williams exclusively worked for Raymours Furniture.
During the course of his employment at the warehouse, Mr. Williams tripped and fractured his elbow. It was a serious injury that left Williams unable to work, and the New York Workers’ Compensation Board readily approved his application filing for medical treatment and indemnity benefits.
The New York workers’ compensation benefits eventually ended. At this time, Mr. Williams filed a claim with the New Jersey Division of Workers’ Compensation for partial permanent disability …
Read MoreThe Common Cost Questions of a NJ Workers Compensation Case
After a work-related injury, the cost of emergency medical treatment, doctor’s visits, physical therapy, medications, and other treatment can be very expensive. As an injured worker sees these costs add up, the importance of a NJ workers’ compensation case simultaneously increases in importance. However, many employees wonder if the expense of recovering these costs through a NJ workers’ compensation case is going to be just another expense of a work injury.
After years representing injured employees in NJ workers compensation cases, our workers’ compensation firm is accustomed to answering a variety of cost and expense-related questions. If you are hurt in New Jersey, and weighing whether or not to file a NJ workers compensation case, read on. The most common questions we receive are asked and answered below.
What are the Common Costs of a NJ Workers Compensation Case?
The typical costs of a NJ workers compensation case depend on a few different variables. For example, if the case is highly contentious between injured employee and insurance company, then the costs are going to be different from a case that is quickly resolved as a misunderstanding or lack of information to the insurance provider.
While the costs between filing for an informal hearing or formal claim with the New Jersey Division of Workers’ Compensation can vary, neither application requires filing fees. Instead, the majority of expenses are incurred to collect evidence and complete due diligence. Such costs include the expense of sending subpoenas, requesting medical records, deposition fees and …
Read MoreHow to Prove a Repetitive Motion Injury for NJ Workers’ Compensation
When it comes to NJ workers’ compensation, many applicable injuries happen in an instant. For example, an employee trips over an extension cord and fractures her arm, or a delivery driver is injured in a motor vehicle accident on his route. While there can be other issues with these claims, it is pretty clear that the incident and resulting injuries were job-related. However, a substantial number of workplace injuries aren’t so clear-cut, for example a repetitive motion injury.
When an employee is injured due to a repetitive motion, such as typing on a keyboard for long hours or twisting to sort different components of a product on an assembly line, there is less certainty how and when the injury occurred. In these examples, and hundreds of similar situations in NJ workers’ compensation, evidence of the injury becomes substantially more important.
What Is a Repetitive Motion Injury?
Repetitive motion injuries are those ongoing aches and pains that arise gradually and over time. It can take months or even years at a specific job before there is any indication of the injury, and many employees continue to work through the initial warning signs of a potential injury.
These injuries often manifest in the neck, back, shoulders, and extremities. In terms of diagnosis, carpal tunnel, tendinitis, and bursitis.
Certain professions are more susceptible to repetitive motion injuries and resulting NJ workers’ compensation claims. Some of these jobs are transportation operators, such as bus drivers, school teachers, factory workers, painters, custodians, typists and …
Read MoreWhat Is the Difference Between Health Insurance and New Jersey Workers’ Compensation for Medical Bills?
If you are injured playing basketball with friends and fracture your arm, you need health insurance to help cover the medical bills from hospital visit or expenses for other care. Depending on your health insurance plan, there are many in New Jersey, you may pay a certain portion of these expenses “out of pocket.”
If you are working as a bartender and fall on the wet floor, fracturing your arm, you are entitled to workers’ compensation to cover the medical expenses. Workers’ compensation is mandated by New Jersey law, but provided through your employer. In New Jersey, nearly all employers are required to have workers’ compensation insurance to cover these incidents. Therefore, a form of insurance also covers these expenses.
While these examples show the basic difference between health insurance and workers’ compensation insurance, the questions and interworking of these two insurance plans are much more in-depth.
If I am Injured at Work, Do I Need Health Insurance?
Currently, the majority of United States citizens are required to have health insurance under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate. To remain compliant with federal law, you probably need health insurance, whether or not you are injured at work.
When it comes specifically to work-related injuries, workers’ compensation will cover these costs. That is why it is essential to document injuries and Of course, there are always contentious cases. An employer or insurance provider may argue that an injury wasn’t actually sustained at work or wasn’t in the …
Read MoreDoes a Pre-Existing Condition Affect Workers’ Compensation in New Jersey?
You slip and fall at work in New Jersey Whether it was a power cord at the office or spilled liquid on the restaurant’s floor, you are likely entitled to workers’ compensation for medical costs resulting from this fall. For instance, if you injured your neck or badly sprained a wrist trying to break the fall.
These injuries could even keep you from work for multiple days, weeks, or more. Then, you would be entitled to disability benefits under workers’ compensation in New Jersey. However, these injuries were not entirely new. You hurt your neck in a softball game four years earlier or broke your wrist rollerblading last summer and it stayed tender and fragile.
Do these old injuries change anything? If you had a pre-existing condition, of any kind, does it affect your right to workers’ compensation under New Jersey law?
Broad Right to Workers’ Compensation in New Jersey
New Jersey workers’ compensation is available to all employees who suffer a job-related injury. This includes employees who acted negligently. It even applies to incidents that involve the recklessness or negligence of a third party. This policy is not only protective of employees who accept risk of injury as part of their job duties, but keeps employers accountable for training, safety standards, and oversight.
The law in New Jersey even covers exacerbation or acceleration of a pre-existing condition. Employers and insurance companies are prohibited from denying workers’ compensation benefits due to a pre-existing condition. Further, how the original injury …
Read MoreWhere Can I Seek Medical Treatment for a Workplace Injury?
Under New Jersey law there are several restrictions on an injured employee’s recovery of workers’ compensation benefits. Some of these restrictions apply to the nature of the injury, for instance there is a basic requirement that the injury happened in the course of employment. This restriction means employers, and their workers’ compensation insurance companies, are not required to provide any benefits to employees who are injured at a recreational league basketball game or doing yard work.
Other restrictions are procedure based. An employee must file a workers’ compensation lawsuit within two years of from the date of the injury or two years from the last benefit payment, whichever is later. After this two year statute of limitations runs an employee is barred from filing a claim with the New Jersey Department of Labor. A New Jersey workers’ compensation lawyer can describe and explain every restriction required to qualify for benefits.
One restriction that can present a problem for employees is that the employer has control of choice over the medical provider covered by workers’ compensation.
Employer’s Chosen Medical Provider
New Jersey’s Workers’ Compensation Law requires that employers must provide or give employees access to reasonable and necessary medical treatment for a workplace injury. Given this standard of care and responsibility for ensuring the care is available falls to the employer, in New Jersey the employer also chooses the covered medical professionals. Typically, the hospitals and doctors that can treat injured employees are actually determined by the employer’s insurance provider.
When …
Read MoreIn What Direction is New Jersey’s Going and Coming Rule Headed?
Most employees in New Jersey have a regular commute to work. For some individuals this means hopping on the bus or even taking the train into New York, but the majority of New Jersey employees are driving to their jobs. In fact, across the United States over 85% of workers who commute go by automobile.
All of this rush hour traffic leads to multiple accidents on New Jersey roadways every day, and unsurprisingly, these accidents frequently result in injuries to employees who are going or coming from their workplace. The question often asked of a New Jersey workers’ compensation lawyer is whether injuries sustained in a motor vehicle accident going or coming from work qualify for workers’ compensation benefits?
What Does the Statute Say?
Essential to determining whether an injured commuter is entitled to workers’ compensation benefits is a section of the Workers’ Compensation Act. Section 34:15-7 states that workers’ compensation covers accidents, “arising out of and in the course of employment.”
The New Jersey Workers’ Compensation Act goes on to clarify that employment begins when an individual arrives at the employer’s place of business and ends when the employee departs from the workplace. This statement seems to explicitly eliminate the drives to and from work as under workers’ compensation, but the act and New Jersey courts have provided some clarification and exceptions.
How Have New Jersey Courts Interpreted the Workers’ Compensation Act?
In 2014 the New Jersey Supreme Court, in the case Hersh v. County of Morris…
Read MoreHow Are Workers’ Compensation Claims Settled in New Jersey?
Employers and their insurance providers often see workers’ compensation claims, and the process of making benefit payments, as an ongoing burden. For these parties, it is valuable and preferable if the situation is finalized swiftly and efficiently through a contractual arrangement with you, the injured employee.
Therefore, it is very likely that in the course of reporting your work-related injury and seeking workers’ compensation benefits (even if you haven’t filed a formal claim with the Department of Labor), your employer or an insurance provider has made an offer to settle. When this offer is extended, most likely it will come from the insurance company, you have two options under New Jersey law for settling your case.
Accepting a Lump Sum Settlement
The New Jersey Statutes Annotated (N.J.S.A.) 34:15-20 provides a mechanism for employers, through or with the insurance company, to make a one-time payment to an injured employee. Often, because of the citation for these one-off payments, those familiar with New Jersey workers’ compensation will call this form of settlement a Section 20 settlement.
Approximately 30% of workers’ compensation cases in the State of New Jersey are resolved through the Section 20 mechanism, but employees often enter the contractual agreement for these settlements without fully understanding the pros and cons of doing so. The upside of resolving a workers’ compensation situation through Section 20 is the lump sum becomes immediately available to the employee to use for past, present, and future medical costs. This can be incredibly attractive for …
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