Houston Workers' Compensation Lawyer

Injured on a Construction Site? Houston Construction Workers' Compensation Lawyer Michael Grossman Can Help You

Suffering an injury due to a Houston construction site accident can be cause for more than just physical pain.

Since construction accidents can often result in serious to severe injury, the accompanying medical costs and other incurred financial losses can often be just as severe. In these instances, an injured construction worker in Houston may not know where to turn in order to get help with their medical expenses or lost wages. Furthermore, they’re likely also wanting answers as to why an accident occurred, or who was responsible for the accident so that the liable parties can be held accountable. An experienced Houston construction workers' compensation lawyer can assist you in these matters, so that answers can be discovered, liable parties can be brought to justice, and compensation can be sought after so that you can start the recovery process. With two decades of experience in work injury accident cases in Texas, Houston construction accident attorney Michael Grossman and his team at Grossman Law Offices are ready to help you through this difficult time so that you can seek proper compensation for your construction accident injury in Houston, TX.

Texas Workers’ Comp Law in Connection to Construction Site Accidents

The State of Texas does not mandate that its employers purchase workers’ compensation insurance. However, many employers do choose to purchase this type of insurance coverage due to the many benefits that it affords an employer. Most notable, an employer that carries workers’ compensation insurance in Texas (also known as a subscriber) is immune to lawsuits from their workers or their workers’ families. There is only one exception to this rule: A subscriber can be sued in the event of a wrongful death caused by the gross negligence of an employer. However, in a majority of workers’ comp cases in Texas, an injured worker for a subscribing employer will only have legal remedy through the workers’ comp process.

Seeking compensation through a workers’ comp policy is often a laborious process filled with mountains of paperwork. Despite the workload and patience often required to see compensation awarded as a result of a workers’ comp claim, such compensation can prove to be beneficial toward items such as medical bills and lost wages. However, compensation through workers’ comp coverage does not take into account issues like pain and suffering, which is a type of damages that is recoverable in a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit. If a subscribing employer is the only liable entity for a construction worker’s accident, a worker will only have one route to seek compensation for their injury - through filing a workers’ comp claim with their employer.

However, our Houston construction accident law firm has worked many construction site accident cases in which there have been multiple liable parties that have all played a role in contributing to a construction accident causing injury. In these instances, we have helped our clients identify all liable parties. Consequently, many of these other liable parties can be held accountable for their actions through a civil lawsuit, such as a personal injury civil suit or a wrongful death civil suit. In other words, the deficit that often exists between the compensation received through a workers’ comp claim and a victim’s actual amount of incurred damages can often be made up through litigating other liable defendants. Seeking out these other liable parties is important, both to ensure that you’re fully compensated for your injury and to ensure that their negligent behavior is not left unchecked. It should also be noted that an injured construction worker can seek compensation through a workers’ comp policy in addition to seeking legal action against other liable parties that may have been responsible for the same on-the-job accident.

For example, an injured worker filing a workers’ comp claim may see compensation for only 70% of his or her lost wages due to time off from work. Even then, a cap exists on the total amount of money that can be awarded for lost wages per week through a workers’ comp claim. When an injury results in a worker never being able to work again, the same cap still exists, meaning that an injured worker may stand to make a paltry, weekly sum for the rest of their life that is supposed to go toward proper health care or other, similar needs. Without other legal recourse, an injured worker may receive a far-less-than-fair settlement through only pursuing a workers’ comp claim. Consequently, seeking to identify all liable parties can be a crucial step toward ensuring that your incurred financial losses are suitably compensated.

What if My Construction Employer Isn’t Covered by Workers Comp?

When a negligent employer in Texas is not covered by workers’ compensation insurance, that employer can be sued through a personal injury or wrongful death lawsuit. Since they do not have the protection against lawsuits that comes with purchasing workers’ comp coverage, such non-subscribers are open to litigation should a construction site accident occur that results in injury or death. However, many employers that are not covered by workers’ comp will act as if they are covered by workers’ comp. Following an accident that may result in a claim of some sort being brought against them, some non-subscribers may attempt certain tactics in order to get an aggrieved party to believe that they’re not allowed to sue their employer. In many instances, an injured worker may receive false information, or may receive very vague information in regards to whether or not their employer is covered by workers’ compensation insurance.

Often, one of the only sure ways to verify your employer’s workers’ comp status is to hire an experienced Houston construction workers' compensation lawyer that can look into the matter on your behalf. Once an employer’s workers comp status has been correctly identified, then proper and specific legal action can be undertaken. It’s is never a good idea to proceed with a workers’ comp claim or a civil lawsuit until the aspect of workers’ comp is fully known. Your construction employer can pretend to have workers’ comp, even offering you weekly payments that may appear to be from an outside insurer, when, in reality, they are checks given by the company in the hopes that you won’t seek legal action that could eventually cost them a fortune. If you have reason to believe that your employer may not be forthright about their workers’ comp status, contact our law firm. Non-subscribing employers know that they are open to litigation without a cap on the amount of damages that can be recovered. Since construction site accident injuries in Houston can be quite severe, the amount of money that such non-subscribers may ultimately be responsible for can be quite high. Damages that can be sought against non-subscribers are the same damages that can be sought in personal injury or wrongful death lawsuits: medical bills, lost wages, lost earning capacity, emotional duress, pain and suffering, etc. Consequently, non-subscribing employers will often do as much as they can in order to prevent their workers’ comp status from being discovered, or from having to pay out what will likely be quiet a sizable sum. As such, Houston construction workers' compensation lawyer Michael Grossman can help you against non-subscribing employers so that you won’t be taken advantage of by their tactics.

What Does Sole Proximate Cause Mean?

Since workers’ comp law in Texas was written in such a way as to encourage employers to purchase workers’ comp insurance, there are some aspects contained in the law which were purposefully designed to coerce employers into getting such coverage. For example, a non-subscribing employer is only allowed one defensive measure if their negligence has contributed to a construction worker’s injury or death. This defensive measure is called sole proximate cause. It means that the employer’s legal representation must be able to prove that the injured construction worker was wholly responsible for the accident resulting in their injury. This requires a very high standard of proof on the defense’s part, since even a 1% portion of liability by the employer would cause the sole proximate cause defense to crumble. However, an injured construction worker must have relevant evidence in order to prove that they were not wholly responsible for an accident. This is even more true in the event of a wrongful death lawsuit following a fatal construction accident in Houston. Since the victim cannot speak for themselves (and since the defense will attempt to call into question the deceased worker’s competence while on-the-job), strong evidence must be located and presented so that the worker’s rights can be protected.

Injured as a Contractor on a Houston Construction Site?

One of the ways that construction companies can attempt to skirt liability for an accident is to claim that the injured construction worker was a contractor. Since contractors are responsible for their own safety while on-the-job, they cannot hold the company that has contracted them to do labor liable for an accident that might happen to them while working on the employer’s job site. However, Texas law does not have a strict definition in regards to an employee. Consequently, an injured construction worker that has been called a contractor may still be able to seek compensation from a negligent employer if certain aspects may have existed prior to the accident. For example, the following questions can help ascertain whether or not a worker can be classified as an employee:

• Did the employer furnish tools or materials to the worker?
• Did the employer pay the worker per hour or by a salary?
• Did the employer hire the worker for a non-specific amount of time?
• Did the employer manage the worker’s job while the job was on-going?
• Did the employer require the worker to sign a document limiting the worker’s rights, such as an agreement to drug testing or an employee handbook?
• Did the employer withhold taxes or social security from the worker’s paychecks?
• Did the worker only work for the one specific employer?

If any of these questions can be answered in the affirmative, a worker who may have been called a contractor may be able to be defined as an employee, thus substantiating the employee/employer relationship so that an injured construction worker can stand to receive the same benefits as an employee. However, proving such a relationship can take the work of an experienced Houston construction workers' compensation lawyer who can provide relevant evidence showing why a “contractor” should be considered an employee.

In addition to contractors, many construction sites also utilize borrowed workers in order to get large amounts of work done in a short amount of time. When borrowed workers are injured while at a construction site, the employer that has borrowed them may attempt to skirt liability for their injury in the same way that they attempt to refuse liability for the injury to a “contractor.” However, many of the same questions presented above, in addition to the following, can also be used in order to prove an employee/employer relationship between a liable employer and a borrowed employee:

• Was the employee borrowed for a certain amount of time?
• Can the borrowing employer fire or hire the borrowed worker at any time?
• Did the borrowing employer specifically request one worker?
• Did the borrowing employer fill a general position, i.e. one that almost anyone could accomplish, with a borrowed worker?

If these questions can be answered in the affirmative, a borrowed employee may be able to be proven to have been an employee, granting them the same rights to file a workers’ comp claim or to seek proper legal action should they have sustained an injury while working for a borrowing employer. However, as previously stated, an experienced Houston work injury attorney will likely be necessary in working to substantiate a borrowed employee’s claim to proper employment status so that they can stand to receive fair compensation for their construction site injury.

Contact Houston Construction Workers' Compensation Lawyer Michael Grossman

With 20 years of relevant experience in the field of work injury law, Michael Grossman and his team at Grossman Law Offices are ready to help you seek fair compensation for your construction site injury. We understand how devastating such an accident can be, and how the physical pain of an injury can be exacerbated by the financial toll that lost wages and medical bills can often take on a victim. Should you have lost a loved one due to a fatal construction accident in Houston, we understand the great loss you’ve experienced. While no amount of compensation can return your loved one to you, we also know that a family that has lost a loved one, especially if that family member was the primary wage earner, may be experiencing financial difficulties as a direct result of their loss. We want to help make sure that you don’t have to suffer further financial harm due to your unforeseen loss. Additionally, we want to help you seek justice against the parties responsible for your loved one’s passing.

Seeking legal action against employers is not a task to be taken lightly. Unfortunately, some construction companies are prone to worrying more about their bottom-line than with the safety of their workers. When a claim is brought against them, they will likely attempt many different tactics in order to not be held ultimately responsible for the accident. They may claim to be worker’s comp subscribers when they’re actually not. They may claim that the injured worker was a contractor and thus wholly responsible for their own actions. They may attempt to pin blame onto any other entity that may have been involved in the accident. Often, the only way to hold such an employer accountable for their actions is to involve experienced legal help, such as Houston construction workers' compensation lawyer Michael Grossman. After having dealt with these types of construction employers for the last two decades, the Houston construction accident lawyers at Grossman Law Offices are able to conduct thorough investigations into construction site accidents in Houston so that all liable parties are properly identified. We want to ensure that you’re fully compensated for your injury or loss, and that each liable party is brought to justice for their role in the construction accident.

Contact Houston construction workers' compensation lawyer Michael Grossman at 1-855-392-0000 for a free legal consultation with one of his legal professionals. It’s a toll-free call that can likely answer many of the questions you may still have in regards to seeking legal action against a negligent employer, or in regards to filing a workers’ comp claim so that you can seek compensation for your construction site accident injury. With our ample experience, wide legal knowledge, and well-earned reputation for helping our clients, we’re ready to help you through this difficult time toward a better tomorrow.