If you’ve been injured on the job in Massachusetts, you probably already know you can file a workers’ compensation claim. What a lot of injured workers don’t realize is that workers’ comp and a personal injury lawsuit aren’t mutually exclusive. Depending on how the accident happened, you may be entitled to both, and the second claim is often worth significantly more than the first.
What Workers’ Compensation Covers, and What It Doesn’t
Massachusetts workers’ compensation is a no-fault system. Under M.G.L. c. 152, if you’re injured on the job, you’re entitled to benefits regardless of who caused the accident, even if the accident was partly or entirely your own fault. In exchange for that no-fault guarantee, the system caps what you can recover. Workers’ comp pays a portion of your lost wages (generally around 60 percent of your average weekly wage, subject to state maximums), covers reasonable medical treatment related to the injury, and pays a scheduled amount for certain permanent impairments.
What workers’ comp does not pay for is the full picture of what an injury actually costs you. There’s no compensation for pain and suffering, no compensation for loss of enjoyment of life, and the wage replacement is a percentage of your earnings, not the full amount. If you’re seriously injured and unable to return to your previous occupation, workers’ comp alone often leaves a significant gap between what you’re paid and what you’ve actually lost.
There’s also a tradeoff built into the system: in exchange for guaranteed no-fault coverage, you generally cannot sue your employer for negligence, even if your employer’s carelessness caused the accident. Filing a workers’ comp claim is also protected activity, and your employer cannot legally retaliate against you for doing so.
The Third-Party Claim Most Injured Workers Don’t Know About
Here’s the part that surprises a lot of people. While you generally can’t sue your own employer, you absolutely can sue someone else whose negligence caused or contributed to your injury, and that claim is a full personal injury claim, not limited to workers’ comp’s reduced benefits. This is called a third-party claim, and it exists alongside your workers’ comp claim, not instead of it.
Third-party claims come up constantly in real workplace accidents. A few common scenarios:
Construction sites. Construction workers are injured by subcontractors, general contractors other than their direct employer, or property owners. If you work for an electrical subcontractor and you’re injured because a different subcontractor’s scaffolding collapsed, or because the general contractor failed to maintain safe site conditions, you may have a third-party claim against that other company, separate from your workers’ comp claim against your own employer.
Defective equipment and machinery. If a piece of equipment, a tool, a machine, or a vehicle malfunctions and causes your injury because it was defectively designed or manufactured, you may have a product liability claim against the manufacturer. This is common in industrial accidents, forklift injuries, and equipment failures of all kinds.
Vehicle accidents while working. If you’re injured in a car accident while driving for work, whether you’re a delivery driver, a salesperson on the road, or anyone else operating a vehicle as part of your job, the other driver who caused the crash is a third party. You can pursue a standard car accident claim against them in addition to your workers’ comp claim against your employer.
Premises hazards caused by another company. If you’re injured at a job site or location that isn’t owned by your employer, a delivery driver injured by a hazard at a client’s warehouse, for example, the property owner or another company present at that location can be liable under standard premises liability principles.
Negligent maintenance by outside contractors. If your workplace hires an outside company to maintain elevators, HVAC systems, or other equipment, and that outside company’s negligence causes your injury, that company is a third party you can pursue directly.
How the Two Claims Work Together
When you have both a workers’ comp claim and a third-party claim, the workers’ comp insurer typically has what’s called a lien on any recovery you get from the third-party case. This means that if you receive a settlement or verdict from the third party, a portion of it goes toward reimbursing the workers’ comp insurer for benefits it already paid you. This isn’t double-dipping. It’s a coordination mechanism that exists precisely because the law recognizes you shouldn’t be barred from full compensation just because workers’ comp covered part of your losses first.
In practice, this means the math of a combined claim is more favorable to an injured worker than people often assume. Your attorney negotiates the lien down in most cases, and even after the lien is satisfied, the additional recovery from a third-party claim, which can include pain and suffering, full lost wages rather than the workers’ comp percentage, and future damages, is often substantial.
Why This Distinction Matters So Much
The practical reason this matters is that many injured workers file their workers’ comp claim, accept the benefits that come with it, and never explore whether a third party was also responsible. By the time they realize a separate claim might have existed, the three-year statute of limitations for the personal injury claim may have already run, while the workers’ comp claim itself operates under different deadlines entirely.
This is why it’s worth having any serious workplace injury evaluated by an attorney early, even if you’ve already filed for workers’ comp or your employer’s insurer is handling that side of things without issue. The two systems are separate, the deadlines are separate, and the question of whether a third party contributed to your injury is one that requires looking carefully at how the accident actually happened, not just who you happened to be working for at the time.
What to Do After a Workplace Injury
Report the injury to your employer immediately and in writing if possible. Seek medical treatment and make sure the injury and how it happened are documented accurately in your medical records. File your workers’ comp claim promptly to preserve those benefits. And separately, before assuming the case is simple, ask whether anyone other than your employer, a subcontractor, a property owner, an equipment manufacturer, another driver, played a role in causing the accident.
If you’ve been injured on the job in Massachusetts and aren’t sure whether you have a claim beyond workers’ compensation, I’m happy to look at the facts with you. These cases often turn on details that aren’t obvious until someone who handles both workers’ comp and personal injury claims regularly takes a look.
Call me at 508-775-3118 or email [email protected] for a free consultation.
Attorney Blair E. Weigand — Helping those with legal questions for 35 years and counting.