Workers’ compensation

Report it, even if it seems minor

Some workplace injuries go unreported, or get handled between the employee and the employer “off the record,” often to keep insurance rates down. That works until the injury turns out to be more than it seemed. An injury that was never reported is very hard to claim later, and the employer’s memory of the arrangement tends to fade.

What the system is for

Workers’ compensation exists to keep a work injury from becoming a financial disaster for the worker and a lawsuit for the employer. An injured employee gets medical care and wage benefits without having to prove that anyone was at fault; in return, the employer is protected from being sued over the injury.

That trade is the reason the system pays what it pays, and does not pay for pain and suffering.

What Missouri workers’ compensation pays

Missouri’s law provides three main kinds of benefit for an employee injured while doing the job.

Medical treatment

Treatment for the injury is paid by the employer or its insurer, not by you. Because the employer pays, the law gives the employer the right to choose the doctor. Treatment you arrange yourself, without authorization, may end up at your own expense — so the choice of doctor is one of the first things to talk about.

Temporary total disability

While a doctor says you cannot work because of the injury, you receive a weekly benefit: a share of your average weekly wage, up to a cap set by the state each year. It usually stops when the doctor releases you to work or your recovery reaches its limit, and it can stop sooner. The benefit is generally not taxed.

Permanent disability

When treatment has done what it can and you are still not able to function as you did before, the injury is rated as a permanent disability. “Total” means you cannot work at all, and the benefit continues; “partial” means a lasting loss that does not stop you working, and the law converts the rating into a payment by a formula it sets.

The law pays nothing for pain and suffering.

Benefit rates and rules are set by Missouri law and change. Nothing here states what a particular claim will pay.

Notice and deadlines

Two clocks. The first is the notice to your employer, which is short. The second is the claim itself, which must be filed with the state within its own limit. Neither waits for you to feel better, and neither is paused because the adjuster is friendly.

If the insurer has been paying benefits and stops, that can start another clock. Ask early.

What we do

You do not have to hire a lawyer to file a claim. If you do not, you deal with the insurer’s adjuster and its lawyers yourself, and they do this every day.

We file the claim, handle the adjuster, appear at the hearings, and tell you what each stage means and what it is likely to cost you in time. The choice of a lawyer is a personal decision. Whoever you choose, be sure they have handled Missouri workers’ compensation claims and that you are comfortable working with them.

Police officers, firefighters and other public employees

A line-of-duty injury usually runs through workers’ compensation and through a pension or disability board at the same time. Each has its own forms and its own clock, and a decision in one can affect the other. That work is covered under first responder law.