This morning, as the eyes of America focused on the apprehension of an at-large suspect in the Boston Marathon bombing, another tragedy continued to unfold in the tiny town of West, Texas.  An enormous explosion in a fertilizer plant on April 17^th killed many, injured approximately 200, and caused widespread destruction of homes and property.

As we follow the news from the blast site, our minds turn to the human element—the victims, and particularly the workers killed or injured on the job, and their families.

This grim story is bound to be a debacle for West, Texas workers and their families, because of the scanty workers’ compensation benefits available in Texas.   Texas law is one of the most regressive in the nation concerning workers’ rights.

While the evidence from the scene remains to be sifted and examined, data indicates that the Texas fertilizer plant might have put workers’ safety at risk.   The Los Angeles Times reported that the company had an uneven safety record and a history of infractions.    Last year, West Fertilizer   Co. paid $5,250 to the U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration over violations discovered in 2011, according to records reviewed by the Los Angeles Times.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-fi-mo-west-fertilizer-co-had-spotty-regulatory-history-records-show-20130418,0,519911.story

Note:   Just two hours ago, authorities reported that 12 bodies had been recovered from the rubble of the town.  Some of these were believed to be first responders– firefighters and police–rushing to the emergency to help.    Others may have been workers, simply doing their jobs to support their families.

We are continuing to follow this devastating story and will post again soon.

The recent deal agreed upon between Caterpillar, Inc and the striking machinists in Joliet marks a new era in contract negotiations. So says Robert Bruno, a professor of labor and employment relations at the University of Illinois in Chicago. He predicted now that Caterpillar has broken the link between a firm’s profit and what it pays it’s workers, other manufacturing firms may follow the lead in disputes over salary, benefits and other items such as pensions.

The new six-year contract allows for a one-time 3% pay increase for workers hired after May 2005 but freezes the wages of workers hired before that date. It also doubles healthcare premiums, eliminates pensions and reduces seniority rights.

Needless to say, the workers spirits are broken.

The pay for the workers at the Joliet plant range from $11.50 to $28 per hour with a third of the workers receiving the lower range. In contrast, Caterpillar posted a Second Quarter $1.7 BILLION profit, up 67% from last year’s second quarter. Let’s do the math for a minute. This is what a worker with the new contract at Caterpillar has to look forward to.  Over 30% of the workers affected by this deal will be earning the $11.50 p/h rate. $11.50 p/h x 40 hrs of work = $460 per week. Once we pull out taxes and (doubled) healthcare premiums, the worker may be bringing home around $350 per week…if they are lucky. That’s $1400 net per month or $23,920 gross yearly income.

The federal poverty rate for a family of four in 2012 is $23,050.

A worker being paid at the highest rate of $28 p/h will have an approximate gross annual income of $58, 240. Not a bad salary; as long as your spouse has a job and you don’t plan on buying a new car anytime soon.

By the way, Chairman and Chief Executive Douglas Oberhelman’s total compensation jumped 60% in 2011 to $16.9 million.

Obviously with workers making less, they spend less and the local economy is put into a spiral risking unemployment and job security. There was a time that American companies built up this country, made America strong and had an allegiance to crafting a better way of life for all Americans. Now it seems their mission is to just tear it down worker by worker. That only gives everyone at our firm more resolve to fight for the rights of every worker, union or non-union, in order to keep the playing field as level as possible.

For more information about your rights if you have a personal injury or are injured at work, call us at 312-346-6444.

What constitutes cooperation and completion of a vocational rehabilitation program? One thing is certain, all rehabilitation plans and job searches are different.  The courts generally indicate that the answer to this question depends on the individual facts of the case. The job search and vocational plan for a 35 year old college graduate would vary wildly from a 60 year old who has performed manual labor their entire life.

I recently had occasion to represent an ASE certified auto technician who suffered a severe shoulder injury. After two surgeries to repair a massive rotator cuff tear, I was able to establish that my client would be unable to return to work at the job he loved and had performed for 20 years. As a result, the employer hired a vocational rehabilitation expert who put together a vocational rehabilitation plan for my client.  My client did everything that was asked of him.  He contacted over 300 potential employers over a relatively short period of time.  Things were looking bleak on the job horizon. Finally, he was offered a position that actually utilized some of his skills and knowledge about automobiles.  He was hired by a car dealership as a service writer.  This job had its advantages and disadvantages: he was able to work in an industry he knew and there was some chance of career progression within the company. However, he would be earning about $600 less, per week, than what he made as an auto technician.  In addition, the job was a 3 hour round trip from his house.

My client was tired of not working so he took the job despite the salary decrease and the lengthy commute. When the employer realized that they would be required to pay 2/3 of the difference between what he would be making and his current salary they panicked and tried to start up the vocational process again.  My client agreed but when it came time for a vocational plan the vocational expert was not much of a help.  He merely sent my client unedited Career Builder e-mails which included jobs in Poland and Texas. These job listings were a waste of my client’s time and abilities. Needless to say my client did not have the time to put in the same job search he did when he was unemployed.  Predictably, the employer soon claimed that my client was being uncooperative and refusing to maximize his potential earnings.  The employer was so convinced of their position that they fought the case all the way to the Illinois Appellate Court. The Appellate Court found that my client had successfully completed his vocational rehabilitation when he took the new job.  The employer was required to pay my client $400 per week for life.

Every human being is unique. As such, every vocational rehabilitation plan should be unique to that individual.  Some people will have the skills and ability to find a job quickly. Some will need retraining to obtain a new skill. Some injured workers will require help and direction in building a resume or being interviewed for a job. I have had clients who have not interviewed for a job in 30 years.  The claimant’s responsibility when undergoing or about to undergo vocational rehabilitation varies greatly. It is essential to have an experienced attorney on your side to advocate on your behalf in these situations.

For more information or to talk to an attorney about your rights if you are injured on the job or about to enter a vocational rehabilitation program call (312) 346-6444 or visit our website at www.capronlaw.com

Most workers’ compensation benefits are calculated and based on an employee’s gross average weekly wage. But what is included in the average weekly wage calculation?  Overtime is usually included provided it is mandatory and consistent. What about a bonus or incentive pay?

Bonuses are excluded from an employee’s average weekly wage. Bonuses are commonly defined in the dictionary as something in addition to what is expected or strictly due.  A bonus is received by an employee for no consideration or in consideration of overall performance at the sole discretion of the employer. Incentive pay is something an employee receives in consideration for specific work performed as a matter of contractual right.  There are many jobs that include incentive pay and / or bonuses in their compensation packages, car salesman, retail salesman, insurance agents, store and department managers, even assembly line workers.

My client worked as a service writer at an automotive dealership.  After working for 6 months and proving that he was a good worker he began to receive an additional amount of money for “hours booked” by him and the two other employees performing the same job.  When I deposed his supervisor and the owner of the company they understandably used terms like bonus, incentive pay and wages interchangeably.  The Appellate Court of Illinois was called to look beyond these terms to exam the nature of the pay my client received.  The Court noted that the money was a bonus and would be excluded from the computation of his wage differential award based on the fact that it was given at the whim of the company.  My client had no contractual right to the money, it was not guaranteed and it could be taken away at any time. In addition, the money was not based on the number of hours or the work my client did himself but the entire service department.

The calculation of average weekly wage can be difficult. If the average weekly wage is calculated incorrectly it can result in a large loss of money for the injured worker.   For more information or to talk to an attorney about your rights if you are injured on the job call (312) 346-6444 or visit our website at www.capronlaw.com

There are a lot of cases that seem pretty cut and dry. Here’s an example. An employee works for a few years as a cashier at a company specializing in payday advances. She knows the office tends to get a little busy a day or two before Friday. The office is a bit shorthanded and it’s even busier than usual. The office conditions are less than ideal. It’s a bit cramped and unkempt and the floor is always dirty. The worker complains to her manager a few times about the state of the office but he doesn’t seem to care. His attitude is that the conditions are not enough to keep any customer away who really needs a payday loan.

As she fills out some paperwork for one of the customers, she realizes she needs some extra forms near the back of the office. She turns quickly, takes a step and her feet fly out from underneath her. She lands directly on her wrist while trying to break the fall.

“Craaacck!”

Everyone in the office stops in their tracks. Her coworkers rush over, her manager comes out of his office and someone runs down the street to get some ice. Once she gets to the emergency room at the local immediate care facility, she is diagnosed with multiple fractures in her wrist, put into a cast and sent home. She is also told that she shouldn’t be working for quite awhile seeing that her regular job required her to count money and do data entry work on the computer. She applies for workers’ compensation benefits because she needs to take care of the doctor and hospital bills as well as pay some of her everyday expenses until she can get back to work. At the arbitration hearing, everything seems to be uneventful. Even her coworkers testify that the floor was always dirty in the office. One problem. She couldn’t remember the exact circumstance that had caused her to slip and fall. All she knew was that the floor was filthy, she was in a rush and when she turned around, she slipped and fell.

The chances of this client winning her case would be slim. Without knowing or understanding the circumstances of the cause of the slip and fall, the insurance carrier could come up with numerous reasons that may have caused the accident that were not the fault of the employer. It could have been a small seizure, a fainting spell, maybe even the choice of shoe the client was wearing.

Moral of the story: Document everything. That’s easier said than done when you have just experienced a trauma, I understand. But as you get home or are in a recovery mode, think back, write down your thoughts or have a friend or family member interview you and document the accident. Go back to your workplace if possible and “re-live” the scene. Talk to your coworkers or anyone else who was present at the time of the accident. The more you know, the better.

For more information or to talk to an attorney about your rights if you are injured on the job call (312) 346-6444 or visit our website at www.capronlaw.com

I received a call from a prospective client not too long ago. About four years ago, he injured his knee while on the job. He went through all the proper procedures by notifying his employer and filling out all the paper work. He eventually received his workers’ compensation and had surgery on his knee as well. Simple. It was a straightforward case and everything went rather smoothly. He was back at work in a reasonable amount of time. Case closed…or so he thought.

He wasn’t a client of ours when this happened but this is what I learned about him through our recent conversation. He’s the kind of worker that every employer is looking for.  He’s great guy and a hard worker. He’s the kind of worker you want on your shift or by your side. He has a great sense of humor and didn’t mind doing the “dirty work” if it meant the end result would turn out to be a better product or just a job well done. When he returned back to work after the injury, there were no grudges held and his manager still valued him highly.

Fast forward to the present. As it turns out, the pain in his knee never really went away. It was better for a while and he felt that sooner or later he would be at 100 per cent.

That wasn’t the case. The pain persisted. As a matter of fact, the pain just became worse and worse but he felt he should just tolerate it, “tough it out” and be thankful he had a job. Now he tells me that he visited an orthopedic specialist and it was suggested that he receive a knee replacement. He has been living with this pain for almost four years now. Seeing that he had success the last time with his workers’ compensation claim, it made sense to just resubmit the case with his workers’ compensation carrier and have the knee replacement. That should take care of any issue once and for all, he thought. That’s about the time I heard from him. His carrier refused him explaining the statute of limitations had run out. The law states the statute of limitations as being 3 years from the date of accident or 2 years from the last receipt of benefits, whichever is later.  He then turned it over to his group carrier who told him to take a hike as it was a pre-existing condition and a workers’ compensation problem. He also walked away from any permanent disability compensation as the WC carrier neglected to tell him that he was entitled to additional compensation before the statute had run out.

There is nothing we can do for him.

Lesson learned? Painfully, yes. Unfortunately this is one of those experiences that are difficult to find any benefit from a life lesson. More than likely, he will need to re-train for another type of work. Hopefully he can find that opportunity with his current employer. At the very least, it gives me an opportunity to remember to make my clients aware that they need to document every medical visit they have and also to keep their attorney apprised of their medical progress. As workers’ compensation attorneys, we will counsel you on every benefit that is available to you under the law. It is your right and it is our obligation to you as our client. The last thing we will ever do is to ask you to “tough it out”.

For more information about your rights in the area of worker’s compensation or personal injury, call me at 312-346-6444 or visit our website at www.capronlaw.com

Summer is here and it’s time for a whole new wave of workers to experience their first “real” job. With summer comes a whole new set of opportunities. Park district pools will need lifeguards, restaurants will need more waiters and busboys, farmers will need help with their crops and landscapers will be adding extra help for the season. These and many other opportunities are ripe for the young student or teen looking to save up a little extra money and exhibit some of their own independence. It’s a rite repeated every year and every one of us probably has a great summer job story we tell when we get into the “when I was your age” mode. Most of those stories will be about how hard the job turned out to be and the long hours we logged toiling under the hot sun or flipping burgers behind a steaming grill.

Now, as a parent, I encourage my children to get out in the world and “make their mark”. Learn what working is all about. It’s not only a good way to make some gas money. It’s a great way to pick up a life lesson or two as well. But also now, as a workers’ compensation attorney, I am painfully aware of the dangers that exist to teens as they learn and act on these new life skills. There is hardly a fast food restaurant that exists without a deep fryer filled with boiling oil. Construction sites that employ “gophers” as manual labor are rife with dangers for workplace accidents. Even a job at the local grocery store stocking shelves can pose a threat of a strained shoulder or injured disc.

I don’t want to be a helicopter parent but I still want to be a responsible adult when it comes to my children’s choices. Here are just a few tips I think every parent should consider.

First, listen to your teen when they tell you about their new job. Ask questions. Will there be any safety training? Do they know what the employer expects of them in concern to hours or shifts? Will there be a supervisor present or will they be working on their own? Depending on the job or job description you can come up with a fair amount of queries. Of course you will drive them to exhaustion by asking all these questions (they are teenagers, after all), but a little upfront discussion should give you an overall idea of what they will encounter.

Second, if you have an opportunity to see them in action at work, take a moment out to visit the workplace once they have their job. This may not be practical on a construction site or factory loading dock but it is possible at a number of fast food places or other types of jobs that frequently hire summer help.

It is also important to realize in the case of a workplace injury, your child is covered under the state’s workers’ compensation laws. Many times, a teen or young persons’ claim of being injured is either not taken seriously or is dismissed without the employer taking the proper procedures required by law. The procedures for reporting injuries sustained at a workplace are the same no matter the age of any employee/worker.

I highly suggest you visit our website to learn “The Top Ten Things You Should Know If You Are Injured At Work”. Even better, give us a call at 312-346-6444 or write us an email and we will send you a free pocket size Top Ten list that you can keep as a reference guide. In the meantime, enjoy your summer and feel good about the fact that you might even get a surprise with a full gas tank when you start up your car some morning.

Last week, Representative Elijah Cummings, D-Md introduced a bill that would revise the provisions in the Defense Base Act. The DBA is designed to provide medical treatment and compensation to employees of defense contractors working overseas and injured in the scope and course of employment. The Defense Base Act, in effect, is similar to workers’ compensation as practiced in the United States. This proposal under which the government would pay benefits directly to injured contractors or their survivors —could save taxpayers $250 million a year.

Presently, AIG, the dominant war zone insurance provider, has no comment.

That goes for CNA , ACE and CHUBB as well. It’s no wonder. Collectively, these carriers account for over 97% of the policies written under the Defense Base Act coverage.

While the war in Iraq is officially over and we have promises that the United States will be pulling out of the war in Afghanistan in a few years, Americans by the thousands are still waking up to the dust, sand and dirt that whip through those countries landscapes. These are the American workers subcontracted by corporations who have business in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere around the globe. Some of these companies have exclusive contracts with the host country. Many of these corporations and companies are doing business directly with and for the American government. The pay is usually substantial and with the unemployment situation still in first gear in the U.S., it is an opportunity for those with the skill sets to work in construction, electrical engineering or the oil and energy fields.

Without a doubt, these jobs are hard and dangerous enough just by the nature of the job description. But the picture changes quickly when you realize these overseas workers are in an ever-present danger of being hurt or possibly killed. Many are working in current or recent war zones.

In the last ten years AIG alone has seen a 14-fold increase in profits from issuing coverage under this act while reaping profits of over 400 million dollars. It’s one thing to make a profit. It’s another show a history of disregard to so many of the claimants who have filed claims over the years. I don’t have the space here nor perhaps even the patience to list the atrocities so many of these claimants have endured just through the experience of filing their claims let alone the injuries themselves. I encourage you to do a bit of research on your own.

I am usually not a pessimist, but I am a realist. Once the lobbying factions for the insurance companies take their position on this Defense Base Act bill revision, I expect it to die on the floor. There is just too much money at stake for the insurance companies to stand by idly. However I do commend Representative Cummings for his attention to this matter and believe this is a positive step in protecting our citizens’ rights while they are working overseas. The Los Angeles Times along with ProPublica have an on-going investigation into the issues of subcontractors’ overseas working in war zones. It’s an issue that will be relevant for quite a long time I’m afraid.

For more information about the Defense Base Act or for any workers’ compensation or personal injury questions, call or email Steve Smalling at Capron & Avgerinos (312) 346-6444 or visit our website at www.capronlaw.com

We live in a marvelous age of discovery. Technology, medical science and media, just to name a few areas of growth, have all taken great leaps forward over the last decade. These breakthroughs alone have altered the way we act and think about how we manage our lives today.

Take medical science for example. As workers’ compensation and personal injury attorneys, we are keenly aware of the wonderful advances and technological achievements seen in such a short time span. Procedures not even imagined ten years ago are commonplace as we see injured workers treated with the latest advances in surgery and therapy reducing their back to work time in half of what it might have been previously. Alongside these procedures, pain management has become it’s own specialized subset of medical science in and of itself. The days of “toughing it out” or living with the pain has become passé and quite frankly unacceptable. We applaud the work of each and everyone involved in the medical community for bringing these solutions to fruition but we also feel it must come with a word of warning.

It’s fair to say that ninety-nine percent of our clients have come to us with one shared common issue. Pain. Each and every one of our clients have been injured either in their line of work or have experienced an injury through an accident or mishap. And without a doubt, with injury comes pain. Many of our clients are under some type of medical supervision or pain management program.

Over the twenty-plus years of practicing injury law, our relationship with our clients has given us an insider’s view of medical trends and practices and how pain has been managed for our clients. We readily admit we are not doctors nor pretend to be.  However, speaking with my associates and other members of the injury law profession, we have observed a particular pattern that is developing.  A trend seems to be emerging in the number of cases which clients have been prescribed pain management drugs more frequently and for longer periods of time than in the past. Coupled with a new generation of pain medicines that are stronger and sometimes more addicting than those used previously, it cannot help but give us cause for concern.

We want to be careful not to appear as though we are taking a position against the concept of pain management.  That is not the case whatsoever. We just feel it is prudent that our clients understand the consequences of over relying on prescription medicines as they make their road back to recovery. We will not give medical advice here or in private counsel with our client. That is not our role as attorneys. We will however counsel our clients to maintain an open and truthful relationship with any and all of their medical caregivers, especially throughout the pain management process. We encourage them to read and understand the directions for taking their medicine as well as understand and report any symptoms to their doctor that may occur while under medication. It’s also important to understand how long they can be expected to be on medication, whether alternatives are available and what to expect if they move to other forms of non-drug related pain management.

If you would like to speak with one of our attorneys, please call us at 312-346-6444 or you can visit our website to learn more about your rights if you have been injured.

Injuries. They happen to all of us one time or another. Maybe we stretch a ligament in our knee while working in the yard or pull a muscle on a jump shot playing weekend jock.  We chalk it up to a bit of age or lack of exercise and push on. Understandably, we begin to favor the sprained muscle or twisted joint by using our “good” extremity a bit more. Going up the stairs, loading up a van, moving some boxes. The next thing we know, it’s the “good” knee that is giving us trouble because we’ve been favoring the one that was injured in the first place. And while painful, for those of us working at a desk job or in a career that doesn’t require manual labor, it becomes just a minor inconvenience at worst. A little bit of ointment and a week’s worth of rest will take care of everything and our performance on the job doesn’t usually suffer.

Now think of the injured worker that makes their living on an assembly line, working on a garbage truck or on a loading dock perhaps. Imagine they tore their meniscus or dislocated a shoulder in their line of work. After proper medical treatment, physical therapy and the allotted time off, they go back to their job and attempt to work at the same pace and efficiency they had prior to the injury. Chances are, they are still experiencing some pain or lack of mobility but the job is “what it is” and the expectations are the same as when they left.  The next thing you know, the worker begins to lift or twist their body differently to compensate for the lack of strength or mobility since being injured. And then, you guessed it, the worker is experiencing a new injury that’s directly related to favoring the original injury.

At Capron & Avgerinos, we’ve seen this occur more than just a few times. Clients may come into the office with a slight limp or a complaint about experiencing a new pain but never mentioned it because it didn’t occur from an “event” similar to the previous injury. They tell us that they can’t keep up with their previous performance level or company quota and fear that the consequences may even endanger their job not to mention their health.

Illinois Workers’ Compensation law refers to this injury as a “natural consequence” theory of recovery. The clients don’t know or don’t think they can be covered for the problem that has developed as a result of the initial injury. But the truth is they can be covered under the legal theory of natural consequence that recognizes overuse or overcompensation.  All of the conditions and symptoms must have flowed from the original accident. If this occurs during the pendency of the initial claim, then the natural consequence or aggravation of the extremity that wasn’t initially injured becomes part of the original case. It should be noted that once a case is settled, the client is not allowed to file a separate case for the overuse. Any physical problem or injury from overuse has to manifest/arise while the original claim is pending or else the claim is waived.

From this standpoint, we make it our point to stay in constant communication with our clients throughout the life of their case. As veterans with over twenty years of practice in workers’ compensation and personal injury law, we encourage our clients to keep us informed of their progress and health as they acclimate themselves back into their lifestyle, job or careers.

For more information, visit our website or call us to receive our pamphlet “ Top Ten Things You Should Know If You Are Injured At Work”. Call: (312) 364-6444