Pennsylvania workers who have been injured on-the-job are entitled to receive workers’ compensation benefits for any disabling condition or injury.
The Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Act enables workers to receive compensation for any medical expenses and lost wages for an injury or illness that is work-related until they can return to work. It also provides death benefits for work-related deaths to an employee’s dependent survivors.
If an injury or death is self-inflicted or occurred when an employee violated workplace regulations, any form of compensation can be terminated.
There are several types of workers’ compensation that an employee or his or her surviving dependents can receive after a work-related accident.
Payments for Lost Wages
An employee can be compensated for lost wages if it is determined that he or she is completely disabled and unable to work or is partially disabled and is receiving wages that are less than what he or she earned before the injury.
An employee becomes eligible for wage-loss benefits on the eighth day after he or she has been absent from work due to the injury.
Your wage-loss benefits equal an estimated two thirds of your average weekly income. The minimum benefit rate is 50 percent of the statewide weekly average wage or the lower 90 percent of the worker’s average weekly wage.
After an employee is able to return to work, wage-loss benefits are ended by his or her employer if the injured employee is earning an amount of pay that is equivalent or greater than before the injury.
Other reasons for stopping benefits include:
- A workers’ compensation judge ends benefit pay after a court hearing
- The employee agrees to stop receiving workers’ compensation
- The employee reaches the 500-week limit of receiving partial disability status
Medical Care
If an employee is covered by Pennsylvania’s Workers’ Compensation Act, any reasonable medical treatment that he or she undertakes is paid for by his or her employer. This includes any medicine, surgeries, hospital visits, medical treatments and services, and orthopedic appliances and prostheses.
Even if an employee’s injury does not prevent him or her from missing time at work, health care costs for a work-related injury or illness are compensated.
Specific Loss Benefits
If a specific body part of an employee has been mutilated or lost its ability to function, he or she may be entitled to compensation for the injury.
Death Benefits
If a workplace injury results in an employee’s death, his or her surviving spouse may be entitled to benefits.
Important Time Limits
An employee must notify his or her employer within 21 days of when the injury initially occurred, or else no compensation will be provided. When notifying your employer, you should include the date and location of the accident that caused your injury.
Injury notice must be given no more than 120 days after the injury occurred in order to be compensated for lost-wages or medical expenses.
If an employee has an occupational disease, it must have occurred within 300 weeks from the last date of employment at the jobsite where he or she was exposed to the hazardous source.
If you have experienced a workplace injury or occupational disease, contact the experienced Harrisburg workers’ compensation attorneys at Schmidt Kramer. Our firm can assist you while you file a claim for workers’ compensation and work to help you receive every benefit you are eligible for.
We always provide a free initial compensation and work on a contingency fee basis, which means you owe us no fees unless we are successful in helping you recover compensation.
Call (717) 888-8888 if you have been injured in a workplace accident.