Compensation is the floor, not the ceiling
Workers’ compensation covers your medical treatment and part of your lost wages, and it pays regardless of whose fault the injury was. That is its value. Its limit is that it pays nothing for pain, nothing for permanent loss of the life you had, and a fraction of what you actually earned — and in exchange, you generally cannot sue your employer at all.
What that rule does not do is protect anyone else. If someone other than your employer contributed to the injury, there is a separate claim — a third-party case — and it covers everything compensation leaves out. A driver who hit you while you were working. The owner or general contractor at a site you were sent to. The manufacturer of a machine with a guard removed. The company maintaining the building where you fell. These are the cases most injured workers never learn they had.
The two claims interact and the order matters. Compensation asserts a lien against any third-party recovery, and settling the injury case without the carrier’s consent can forfeit your benefits entirely. That is a genuine trap, and it is avoidable by handling both together.
The cases we handle most
Hurt driving for work
A collision on the clock is both a compensation claim and an ordinary claim against the at-fault driver.
Injured on someone else’s property
Deliveries, service calls and job sites put the property owner and its maintenance contractors in play.
Machinery and equipment
A missing guard or a defective tool is a claim against a manufacturer, not against your employer.
Repetitive and occupational injury
Cumulative damage and exposure illness are compensable even without a single accident to point to.
What we do once you call
We make sure the injury is reported and the compensation claim is filed so benefits and treatment start without a gap.
We work out who else was involved — a driver, an owner, a contractor, a manufacturer — because that is where the real recovery is, and preserve the equipment or scene.
We build both files in parallel and make sure the compensation carrier is properly noticed, so nothing you do in one case damages the other.
We pursue the third-party claim and negotiate the compensation lien down, so the settlement reaches you rather than the carrier.
Common questions
Can my employer fire me for filing?
Retaliating against an employee for claiming workers’ compensation is unlawful in New York. It still happens, and it is worth documenting what is said to you. Fear of retaliation is the most common reason injuries go unreported, and an unreported injury is far harder to claim later.
Does it matter that the accident was my fault?
Not for workers’ compensation, which pays regardless of fault. It can matter in a third-party claim against someone else, but New York reduces a recovery by your share of responsibility rather than barring it.
I’m being paid off the books. Do I still have a claim?
Yes. Workers’ compensation coverage does not depend on how you were paid or on your immigration status, and an employer who paid cash to avoid coverage does not get the benefit of that. Call before you accept anyone’s assurance that you have no rights.