The Difference Between Worker's Compensation and Personal Injury
Summary
There are key differences between a worker's compensation case that you file with your employer versus a personal injury case that happens where you work. Speaking with an experienced personal injury lawyer will help you understand the best course of action to take.
Full Transcript
There really are no mistakes that a client can make because the clients, before they even become a client, they approach a lawyer and they tell the lawyer a little bit about what's going on or a little bit about what happened, and then it's the lawyer's job to say, oh, you know what? I think you actually do have a case here.
But for instance, if a client comes to me and says, I would like to file a personal injury lawsuit, I fell when I was at work and it was my employer that was irresponsible for keeping some liquid soap on the ground, my employer never cleaned that up.
I would tell that person that you can't file a personal injury lawsuit against your employer because if you got hurt at work and it was caused by your employer, that's a worker's compensation matter. In California, it's called an exclusive remedy. If you get hurt at work and it's the fault of your employer, your exclusive remedy is through workers compensation. You can file a lawsuit or if you can find a lawyer that will file a lawsuit on your behalf, but I can almost guarantee you the courts are going to dismiss your case because it's a workers compensation case.
Now, if you're at work and there's somebody that has come into your workplace so for instance, a UPS person or someone from FedEx comes into your office and they do something that is negligent and it causes you injury, well, you then could file a lawsuit against that person in the civil court system, because that person is not your employer. They're visiting your business, and while in the course and scope of doing their job, they did something irresponsible, reckless, or negligent, and you could potentially bring a lawsuit against that person.
a lot of clients that were unfortunately involved in automobile accidents. I, of course, want to hear what happened, how it happened, and I want to get as much, as much detail of the events as possible. But the thing that I always tell my clients that's first and foremost, that is the most important thing is after you've been in a car accident, make sure you seek the medical care that you need. There's going to be plenty of time for you to file a lawsuit if that's what you choose to do.
Final Thoughts
Many personal injury lawyers, including myself, will give a free initial consultation so you can determine if I am someone you feel comfortable sharing sensitive information with, and working with for at least several months to as long as a few years.