Your Workers’ Compensation Questions Answered

What happens when my doctor takes me off work or puts me on restrictions because of my work injury?

The answer depends on your line of work and how bad your work injury is. When you get hurt, your doctor may decide that you should take some time off work or limit your work activities. For example, if you pull a muscle in your back or injure your shoulder, and your job requires you to do heavy lifting or use your arms a lot, your doctor will write a Report of Workability that will either order you to stay off work, or put limitations on what you can do and how much you can lift or push or pull, etc. Your supervisor or boss will need to have a copy of that report and will make a determination if there are any light duty jobs that you can do with your work restrictions.

If there are no jobs within your restrictions, or if your doctor takes you off work completely because of your work injury, you will be entitled to receive wage loss benefits from the workers’ compensation insurance. So long as you cannot work and are recovering from your work injury, workers’ compensation will pay you temporary total disability (TTD) benefits on a weekly or bi-weekly basis – similar to your regular paycheck schedule. The amount of temporary total disability benefits will depend on how much you were making around the time when you got hurt, also known as your average weekly wage. Your temporary total disability will generally equal to two-thirds (2/3) of your average weekly wage, and is not taxable.

Because there are a lot of details and limitations involved in getting approved for temporary total disability wage loss benefits, work comp frequently makes mistakes about the amounts or wrongfully denies those benefits altogether. If you find yourself in a situation where you cannot work because of your work injury, or your employer cannot accommodate your work restrictions, and insurance is not paying you wage loss benefits, or pays less than it should, you should contact an experienced workers’ compensation attorney at Farrish Johnson for a free consultation about your options. Farrish Johnson work comp lawyers have many years of experience and they are standing ready to fight for the rights of the injured workers.

Call attorney Yuri Jelokov at 507-625-2525 if you have questions about workers compensation.