Workers’ compensation is designed to cover for lost wages, medical bills and other costs that may be incurred if a person gets hurt on the job. This can help to take care of these financial responsibilities, and it gives workers peace of mind. They may work in a dangerous profession, but they know that they’ll be financially covered if they ever do get hurt.
But what if you are the reason that you got injured? Maybe you made a mistake. Maybe you committed an error. It’s clear to both you and your employer that you were at fault for whatever event injured you.
For example, perhaps you were supposed to check and make sure that an electrical line was off before you worked on it. But someone else told you that they had turned it off, so you decided that it was a waste of time to check. Sure enough, the line wasn’t off and you suffered electrical burns. This is your own fault because you skipped the step of checking to make sure that the power was off, so does that mean that you’re not qualified for workers’ compensation?
Your fault does not factor in
If something like this has happened to you, especially if your employer is claiming that you no longer get workers’ comp benefits, you’ll be glad to know that fault does not factor into the equation. Under this no-fault system, all workers are covered, no matter who is responsible for their injuries.
The reason it was set up like this was actually to protect businesses. Businesses did not want to be sued by injured workers who claimed that the fault lay with the business. This would have resulted in an astronomical amount of lawsuits every year as the courts tried to determine who was responsible. Instead, by accepting the no-fault system, businesses prevent all of these lawsuits. The benefit for workers is that they don’t have to worry about proving fault and they know that they’re still covered even when they make a mistake.
All this may be true, but that doesn’t mean your employer fully understands it or that they won’t try to deny you the benefits that you deserve. If something like this is to happen, you need to know about all of your legal options.