Construction workers who are injured during the course of excavation, construction, or demolition work often retain construction accident lawyers to advocate for them. A worker injured on a construction site has many legal rights and options to pursue compensation for medical bills, past and future lost wages, and pain and suffering.
An experienced and knowledgeable construction injury lawyer knows the steps to take if you or someone you love is injured in a construction site accident. Those who have been injured while working in the private construction sector may need the services of one of these personal injury attorneys. A lawyer can represent you, advocate for you, and guide you through the process to receive the compensation you need and deserve.
What About Workers’ Compensation Insurance?
There may also be circumstances where an employer fails to cover their construction crew with workers’ compensation insurance. Most employers are required by law to carry workers’ compensation insurance. However, if you discover your employer doesn’t have this coverage, you may still be awarded compensation for your work-related illness or injury.
In general, injured employees aren’t allowed to bring lawsuits against their employers in court for work injuries. However, there’s typically an exception when employers don’t have workers’ compensation insurance. If the company you work for doesn’t have workers’ comp coverage, you may have one of two options:
- Filing a personal injury lawsuit against your employer
- Making a workers’ compensation claim with your state’s uninsured employer’s fund
Your construction accident lawyer can tell you whether both of these options are available to you.
What About Third-Party Negligence?
A construction accident lawyer can investigate your accident and will review whether third-party negligence — not necessarily the employer — may have played a role in your accident. Examples of this include:
- Equipment malfunction
- Subcontractors who fail to follow proper procedures
- Delivery services that stack items in an unsafe manner or a hazardous location
- A slip-and-fall accident happens when a third-party janitorial company leaves a mess
- Defective equipment, like a safety harness or ladder, that points to a third-party claim against that product’s manufacturer
What About Future Medical Care and Costs?
Often these construction site-related injuries are life-altering or permanent, requiring future medical care. A construction accident attorney can seek to recover damages for any future medical costs these disabled victims will need. Your attorney can work to maximize your monetary award for damages and future medical expenses. He or she can negotiate a successful settlement or present competent evidence at trial, proving your need to be awarded money for these costs. You deserve an award of fair and adequate compensation.
Having a construction injury lawyer work to recover future medical expenses may seem unnecessary. Some injured workers might think they can count on their employer’s workers’ compensation insurance or that their private health insurance will cover them in the days, weeks, and months after the case is settled. Furthermore, many with permanent injuries can apply for Social Security Disability, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits and believe this will suffice. However, one or a combination of all of these may be insufficient to provide the needed coverage for medical care and expenses.
Contact a lawyer, if you or a loved one has been injured on the job. A lawyer can help if someone you love has been killed as the result of a construction site accident as well. Contact a workers’ compensation lawyer, from our friends at Law Offices of Franks, Koenig & Neuwelt , today.