Work-Related Illness Claims

The law for employers has not changed despite the coronavirus pandemic. An employee may be entitled to compensation if they contract COVID-19 because their employer has not done enough to ensure that their workplace is ‘COVID-secure’.

Employers have a legal duty to their employees to take reasonable care for their health and safety and they must take reasonable steps to do this. In particular, employers must take steps to secure a safe system of work, safe premises, safe equipment, and competent staff.

If you believe you have contracted COVID-19 due to ineffective health and safety measures implemented at your place of work, you may be able to bring a claim against your employer and secure compensation.

In order for us to assess whether or not you have a COVID-19 at work claim, we would ask all potential applicants to answer the following questions and send us your answers by email in confidence to info@stonhewermoss.co.uk.

This will enable us to determine whether or not you have a case to bring a claim against your employer before arranging a free initial consultation.

Pre-Assessment Questionnaire

The standard three-year rule for personal injury claims does not apply for work-related illnesses or industrial disease claims.

In these cases, the general rule is that the limitation clock does not start ticking until the injured person becomes aware that they have an injury and that the injury is related to work. Once the limitation clock starts, then you generally have three years from that date to make a claim.

A typical example would be someone who worked in a noisy factory for many years in the 80s and 90s but who only became aware they had started losing their hearing in the last few years.

As specialist personal injury lawyers, we will be able to advise you on your rights.

Once diagnosed with a work-related illness or industrial disease, the next step is to get in touch with us as soon as possible to see if you have a claim.

We offer a Free No Obligation Case Review so that we can understand more about the accident circumstances and to advise you on whether or not you have a claim.

Such cases are often complex and require a solicitor with experience and expertise in these types of claims as in most cases, there is not one single event which caused the injury, it may have developed during employment with 1 or more employers dating back many years, and some, if not all, of those companies, may no longer exist.

We will guide and support you throughout the personal injury claims process, dealing directly with your employers and their insurance company, tracking down companies if necessary, on your behalf to secure the compensation you deserve for your injuries.

In handling your claim, we will also look at other financial aspects such as medical expenses and loss of earnings you may have had as a result of the illness. We will also factor into the value of your claim any long term medical expenses that you may incur for life-changing injuries that require ongoing medical treatment. The value of every compensation claim for a work-related illness depends on the seriousness of the injury as well as the chances of you making a full recovery.

We will also seek to obtain interim payments where possible to help you to avoid financial hardship caused by industrial disease, as well as making claims on behalf of families who have lost loved ones to a work-related illness or industrial disease.

Whatever the nature of your injury, our aim is to get you the highest amount of compensation as quickly and stress-free as possible.

No. Your compensation is usually net of tax. Any claim for loss of earnings will be paid less any tax and National Insurance you would have paid. If you are claiming benefits related to your accident, your award might be reduced to repay these benefits. If you are claiming benefits not related to the accident, your lump sum award may affect your entitlement to benefits. We can help you with this by creating a personal injury trust.

The responsibility for an accident at work is very often it is the employer, even though they may try to blame you or even discipline you for the accident. However, sometimes the accident might be the responsibility of a third party, for example, a building site main contractor. It might be due to the fault of a work colleague acting in a manner not related to the job. It might even be your own fault in whole or in part. If you are unsure, get in touch with our personal injury lawyer for a free initial case review in complete confidence.

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An interim payment in a personal injury claim is an amount of money paid by the insurance company for the Defendant to the Claimant prior to settlement of the claim. For example, in some cases, people often cannot get back to work immediately and consequently have a much-reduced income. In such cases, we can often make an application for an interim payment for you to alleviate any short-term financial difficulties.

In larger cases where someone has been very seriously injured, we may ask for an interim payment to enable works to be undertaken on the injured persons’ house to make it more accessible, for example, a walk-in shower or to lower the kitchen work surfaces for a wheelchair user. 

There are certain limitation periods for making a personal injury claim and some exemptions too.

The Limitation Act stipulates the date by which you can make a claim after you have had an accident. In most cases, this is three years from the day the accident occurred. After this time, you cannot easily make a claim unless there is some special reason why you should be allowed to do so. For example, if you were unable to deal with your own affairs for a period of time.

There are exceptions, for example, the limitation date for children who have an accident when they are under 18^th. is their 21^st birthday. That is three years from when they became an adult. 

If your injury was not caused by a one-off event, for example, a repetitive strain injury, then the three-year timeline only starts to run on the day you became aware you had an injury as a result of the negligence of a third party. This might be the day you are diagnosed with a condition by your doctor.

There are a lot of exceptions to the three-year limitation date rule (you might only have one year to make a claim if your accident was in Spain or two years if it was on a boat) so the best advice is to give us a call and we will tell you where you stand.

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