Given the heavy equipment and generally hazardous surroundings often involved in an unsafe work environment, a construction accident can have catastrophic physical, financial, and emotional consequences for the victim and the victim’s household.
With these profound and potentially life-changing ramifications, initiating a timely construction accident claim takes on vital importance particularly for reimbursement for medical costs and lost wages. What follows is a series of steps to take if such an accident unfortunately occurs.
One of the most efficient ways to proceed on a construction accident claim is by hiring a New York Construction Site Accident Lawyer to manage the process right from the beginning and that obviously includes as a major or principal factor protecting your legal rights to compensation.
If you’ve been harmed in a construction accident, call 911 and request paramedic help. In addition to elevating your health to the number-one priority, the call into emergency services documents that an accident did occur and was reported in real time.
Even if EMTs decide that transporting you to the hospital is unnecessary, visit an urgent care clinic or your primary care physician as soon as possible for a further diagnosis and whatever additional medical attention that might be necessary.
In addition to addressing your health needs, this visit and follow-ups provide further documentation of the accident.
After initially reporting the accident to emergency services, you should promptly alert your supervisor, HR, or other management person in your company, and your labor union (if applicable) in writing if you are an employee who has become injured while on the clock on a construction site.
If you’re an employee, your employer should have a standard procedure already in place for reporting construction site accidents.
The incident report and related paperwork should also trigger the initial stages of the workers’ compensation benefits process.
If you are an independent contractor, visitor, bystander, pedestrian, etc., injured on a construction site, report the accident to the property owners, general contractors, or another appropriate official so they, in turn, can notify their liability insurance providers.
Insofar as the property owner is concerned, a premises liability claim may be appropriate.
Compile as much information at the accident as possible and particularly before any clean-up activities might occur.
Relevant material extends to taking video or still photos of the scene, equipment involved or property damage, your injuries, witness statements, and so on. It may also involve securing physical evidence such as malfunctioning tools.
The more evidence that you and your attorney can gather will pay dividends, metaphorically and perhaps literally, as your claim moves forward.
It can be helpful to your case to assemble detailed records of, e.g., doctor visits and medical bills, and physical therapy treatment and rehabilitation protocols, plus a diary of your day-to-day challenges that you are experiencing to your quality of life, including ongoing pain and suffering and emotional distress.
Make a note of anything else that seems relevant, even if it seems relatively mundane.
A contemporaneous trove of data can make your claim, regardless of which direction that it goes in, more persuasive.
As a threshold matter, construction sites must comply with federal and state workplace safety laws and regulations.
Evidence of an unsafe working condition, and/or lack of proper safety protocols or worker training, absence of personal protective gear, can be decisive, especially if an employer tries to deny a workers’ comp claim.
Therefore, non-compliance with government regulations, such as OSHA violations, can consist of evidence of negligence or worse that can bolster a claim.
In addition to reviewing the facts of circumstance that can determine liability or fault in a construction accident, your attorney can identify your rights and legal options moving forward.
Again, an employee might be limited to collecting benefits through the workers’ comp system as the exclusive remedy. You cannot take legal action against your employer after getting hurt on a construction site in New York if you are receiving workers’ compensation, subject to certain exceptions.
A workers’ comp claim should be filed within 30 days of the accident or sooner. According to the New York Workers’ Compensation Board, if 30 days pass and you have not notified your employer, you may lose your rights to workers’ compensation benefits.
Exceptions may apply for an occupational disease that manifests later.
Furthermore, other parties might be named as third-party defendants in some narrow scenarios.
If an apparatus defect, as one example, played a role in the construction accident, the employee might be able to pursue a separate product liability claim for defective equipment against equipment manufacturers or possibly other entities in the chain of commerce.
An act or omission by architects that lead to a construction accident could also give rise to construction accident claims.
Non-employees harmed at a construction site typically pursue a claim through the traditional personal injury lane.
For a civil lawsuit that may culminate in a trial, an injured party must take the case to court, should that become necessary absent a settlement, no later than three years – i.e., the statute of limitations — from the date of the accident.
In a tragic circumstance where a non-employee victim perished in a construction accident, the statute of limitations for a wrongful death lawsuit is two years.
An experienced personal injury lawyer knows the complexities of construction site accident claims which generally can be highly nuanced.
Competent legal counsel also brings to a table a command of the intricacies of workers’ compensation laws along with the necessary skills to negotiate and litigate to recover compensation for you.
Your attorney can take charge of all the complicated paperwork requirements and otherwise navigate the claim in all of its contours on your behalf.
The claim filing system can be fraught with pitfalls. As such, legal assistance is highly recommended rather than trying to handle it on your own.
Employees of construction companies with construction injury claims will in most instances go the workers’ compensation route.
A seasoned attorney can assist you in filing an initial claim to the Board, which is designated by state regulators as form number C-3, along with any proceedings that follow.
For injured non-employees or independent contractors, subcontractors, their attorney can contact and then submit a claim to the property owner or general contractor under their insurance coverage or self-insured status and then negotiate from there.
Government entities such as New York City or the state of New York might be liable too in some capacity if they were responsible for, e.g., a non-repair of a dangerous condition that contributed to an injury.
Contact a Construction Accident lawyer Today
As alluded to above, a lawyer can professionally analyze your case, put together the necessary evidence, properly evaluate the scope of your damages and losses, and manage all the required legal paperwork in an accurate and timely manner.
Spektor & Associates, P.C. has successfully represented many clients, including injured New York City construction workers in obtaining certain damages and other aspects of financial compensation for them. Contact us today to schedule a free consultation.
