With almost 3 million workplace injuries recorded in the U.S. each year — according to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics at BLS.gov — having a plan to prevent work injuries and respond to work injury claims is a must for any business.
Depending on the severity of an employee’s injury, they could be eligible for workers’ compensation benefits, disability benefits, or even a personal injury settlement. Here’s what employers need to know about work injury claims, including types of job injuries and how to use claims management software to facilitate the claims process.
What Are Work Injury Claims?
Work injuries range from minor workplace accidents that can be handled on the spot to serious injuries that require ongoing medical treatment. Not all incidents will require a work injury claim, but those that do tend to fall into one of three categories:
- Workers’ compensation insurance covers medical expenses and lost wages if an employee is injured on the job or in the course of their employment.
- Disability benefits may be available if an injured worker can’t return to work for an extended period — i.e., short-term disability insurance. Injured workers may be eligible for partial disability or permanent disability compensation.
- A personal injury claim involves compensation for legal fees, court costs, or punitive damages in cases when the employee was injured due to employer negligence. Your employers’ liability insurance may cover these costs.
It’s also worth noting that not all work injuries are obvious at the time. The Department of Labor (DOL.gov) distinguishes between different categories of injuries:
- Traumatic injuries are the result of a “specific event” during a “single work day or work shift,” such as a slip-and-fall incident or equipment malfunction.
- Occupational diseases are injuries or impairments that develop over time due to work-related causes, such as carpal tunnel syndrome or hearing loss.
In the case of a workplace fatality, family members may be eligible for death benefits under workers’ comp depending on workers’ compensation laws in your state.
Why It’s Important to Track Work Injury Claims
Even if you only deal with a small number of workplace injuries, it’s a good idea to track them using a workers’ comp case management system. Not only will it help you resolve cases more quickly, but you can be proactive about preventing future accidents.
Here are three reasons why it’s important to track work injury claims.
Provide a Safe Working Environment
Keeping track of the frequency and severity of workplace injuries helps you foster a safer working environment. When you know which types of incidents are occurring — and whether or not employees are at risk of specific occupational illnesses — you can take steps to mitigate those risks and ensure workplace safety.
Support Injured Employees
Managing work injury claims helps you support injured employees so they can get the medical care they need and recover sooner. When it comes to filing for workers’ comp, it’s your job to submit a claim form on behalf of the injured employee.
By streamlining the claims process, you can minimize the impact of medical bills and wage loss and guide them through a personalized return-to-work program.
Adhere to Regulatory Standards
By tracking work injury claims, you’ll be able to meet your HR compliance obligations under state and federal law. In addition to filing a workers’ compensation claim with your insurance company, you may be required to report serious injuries to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and your state’s division of workers’ compensation.
6 Steps to Handling (and Avoiding) Work Injury Claims
Because so much depends on filing a prompt work injury claim — both for the employee and your business — it’s important to have a process in place to avoid lost time in filing a claim with your insurance carrier. Follow these steps to streamline the process and make claims reporting more efficient and accurate for everyone affected.
1. Maintain Employers’ Liability Insurance
Many states require employers of a particular size to maintain workers’ compensation coverage. While employers’ liability insurance is optional, it will protect you from work injury claims that aren’t covered by workers’ comp. If the injury was due to employer negligence, or if an employee takes you to court, you’ll have some protection.
In fact, your insurance company may offer liability insurance as part of your business insurance package, so you may not even need an additional policy.
2. Provide Appropriate Safety Training
Next, create an effective safety training program so employees know how to deal with heavy machinery, hazardous materials, and anything else that might put them at risk. Ideally, this will be part of your onboarding process, but you may need to provide an annual refresher course to ensure OSHA compliance.
When you use a platform like Pulpstream to streamline the onboarding process, you can also schedule reminders for follow-up training modules and certifications.
3. Complete Audits and Inspections
Discussing workplace safety topics with your employees is a great place to start, but you’ll also need to conduct safety audits and inspections on a regular basis. Not only will this help you identify issues before they become a problem, it will also create a paper trail to show you did your due diligence to ensure workplace safety.
Pulpstream’s cloud-based platform is the perfect tool for audits and inspections, since it’s compatible with desktop and mobile devices to facilitate inspections on-site and in the field. Enable faster inspections by digitizing forms and reducing paperwork.
4. Report Incidents Promptly
Not all incidents are likely to result in an injury, but making sure employees know how to write an incident report is key to avoiding future accidents. An incident report can bring a previously unknown hazard to light, and serve as crucial evidence later.
Use Pulpstream’s incident management platform to fast-track incident management. Gather evidence, collect witness statements, upload photos and videos, and more. Plus, conduct a comprehensive root cause analysis to find out what went wrong.
5. Run Claims Analytics
If you’re dealing with excessive work injury claims, then it may be a sign that someone is taking advantage of your workers’ compensation system. In some cases, employees could be claiming medical reimbursements or workers’ comp benefits that they aren’t eligible for — but employers have been known to commit workers’ comp fraud too.
With claims analytics, you can monitor your workers’ compensation program for any suspicious patterns or irregularities. Track claims by month, type, and other factors using Pulpstream’s handy dashboards and reporting features.
6. Take Corrective Action
Finally, if you can identify the cause of a workplace injury, take action to make sure it doesn’t happen again. Create a corrective action plan to address equipment failures, safety lapses, and other issues that arise during a workplace investigation.
Whether you need to implement a performance improvement plan or take disciplinary action, Pulpstream has you covered. Of course, seek legal advice in cases of serious workplace violations resulting from employee misconduct.
Manage Work Injury Claims with Pulpstream
Work-related injuries are more likely in some industries than others, but every business needs a workplace safety plan and a process for managing workers’ comp claims. By conducting audits and inspections, documenting incidents, and responding to injuries promptly, you’ll show employees that you take your responsibilities seriously.
Pulpstream’s claims management platform can handle workers’ comp claims, liability claims, warehouse claims, and other claim types. Enhance your claims management process with standardized claim documentation, OSHA report generation, insurance adjuster communications, and more — all in a single cloud-based platform.
Request a demo today to see Pulpstream at work!
