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No matter your employer and no matter the requirements of your profession, your company has a duty of care for its employees which is enforceable through the legal system. If you’ve suffered an injury at work, you’re entitled to compensation, no matter how ‘risky’ your job, because that will all be part of the contract you signed with them.
The question is: where do you go from here? If you’ve had an accident during work hours, there are certain steps and procedures you should follow to ensure that you not only get the immediate care you may need, but any financial help.
- Report the injury.
This is obviously the most crucial initial step. For your legal protection, in order to avoid any possible discrepancies which may arise following your injury, ensure that you’ve reported the incident to your employer and clearly state what happened. Of course, as well as providing a log on the record when the question of sick pay or compensation most likely comes into play at a later date, this is for the benefit of everyone at your company. If there’s a safety hazard in your workplace, it’s vital that everybody else knows, so any further accidents can be avoided. This takes us to the next important step.
- Ensure a health and safety assessment takes place.
By law, your employer has to ensure that the workplace is a safe environment within which people can work without any health risks. If there’s an accident, ensure that they report it, rather than sweeping it under the rug, because otherwise further injuries could be inflicted on other employees.
- Browse your contract for ‘accident pay’.
The core worry in your mind is most likely, depending on the severity injury, what this means for your work. If you have to take time off work, whether that’s 1 week or 6 weeks, you’ll want to ensure that the company can cover you financially for all that time off. Not only might you have medical bills, but you have ordinary bills and food to buy. Don’t let yourself be dismissed by your employer.
- Get legal help.
The most important final step is getting a helping legal hand. You may want to sort out your claim by yourself, but you’re most likely not claiming everything that you could be. If you consider hiring civil lawsuit attorneys at companies such as LawsuitLegal, you’ll be getting peace of mind in the knowledge that everything you could have done, you did.
If you’ve had an accident at work which wasn’t your fault, you don’t want to cut yourself short, especially given all the fees incurred and the possibility of taking several weeks or months off work. You have bills to pay and food to eat, so ensure that you’re financially covered for the accident which took place on company property. You’re entitled to it.
Whilst you may only be concerned with getting better at the moment, make sure that you’re fully aware of your legal options in terms of compensation and the proper pay you should be receiving if you require any time off to recover.
