# Workers compensation lawyer in Baton Rouge > Louisiana workers’ compensation representation from The Tadda Law Firm, 20 to 30 percent of the firm’s practice. Canonical page: https://www.taddalaw.com/workers-compensation-lawyer-baton-rouge/ Workers’ compensation is roughly a quarter of this firm’s work. It pays medical treatment and a portion of wages, as you go, without any question of fault. ## Fault is not the issue, course and scope is Nobody has to have been careless for a compensation claim to exist. The question is whether the injury arose in the course and scope of employment, which in plain terms means on the clock and doing your work. Because benefits are paid as they accrue rather than accumulating toward a settlement, a compensation claim does not build value the way an injury claim does. What makes a claim substantial is permanent consequence. ## What workers’ compensation pays Two things: medical treatment for the work injury, and a portion of lost wages. While you cannot work at all, temporary total disability benefits under [La. R.S. 23:1221](https://www.legis.la.gov/legis/Law.aspx?d=83447) are sixty-six and two-thirds percent of your wages, subject to the state’s weekly limits. There is a short waiting period. Under La. R.S. 23:1224, no compensation is paid for the first week after the injury, but if the disability continues for two weeks or longer, that first week is paid after the first two weeks have passed. ## Your compensation rate can be wrong The weekly benefit is calculated from your average weekly wage, which for an hourly worker generally looks back at the four full weeks before the injury. If that window happened to contain short weeks, the average comes out low and stays low. If it contained a plant turnaround with heavy overtime, it comes out high. Most people have no way to check whether the arithmetic is right. Bringing pay records to the consultation is the single most useful thing an injured worker can do. ## Returning to work at lower pay If restrictions leave you unable to earn ninety percent of what you earned before, Louisiana addresses the difference through supplemental earnings benefits. Under La. R.S. 23:1221(3), they pay sixty-six and two-thirds percent of the difference between your pre-injury wages and what you earn or are able to earn afterward, for up to 520 weeks. That future stream is usually what gets valued when a claim is resolved. In Erik Tadda’s words, wages drive the value of a workers’ compensation case: someone released to limited, sedentary work can be found a job, and what matters is how much less that job pays. ## Choosing your own doctor Under [La. R.S. 23:1121](https://www.legis.la.gov/legis/Law.aspx?d=83367), you have the right to select one treating physician in any field or specialty. You do not have to treat with the doctor your employer picks, although you do have to attend examinations by a physician the employer provides and pays for. Choose actively, and early. If you are treated by a physician your employer or insurer did not specifically send you to, the statute treats that physician as your choice. After your first choice, changing to another doctor in the same specialty needs the insurer’s consent, while moving to a doctor in a different specialty does not. If the insurer refuses your initial choice, the statute gives you the right to an expedited hearing. ## When treatment is delayed or denied A claim can be accepted and still stall. Under [La. R.S. 23:1142](https://www.legis.la.gov/legis/Law.aspx?d=83379), each health care provider may incur no more than $750 in nonemergency testing or treatment without the agreement of the insurer and the employee, so most meaningful treatment has to be approved first. In practice the physician requests it on a form known as the 1010. If the request is denied, the next step is an appeal to the medical director of the Office of Workers’ Compensation Administration. Under [La. R.S. 23:1203.1](https://www.legis.la.gov/legis/Law.aspx?d=108459), that appeal must be filed within fifteen calendar days, and the medical director must decide it within thirty calendar days. A party who disagrees with the decision can then file a disputed claim within forty-five days. There is also a practical problem worth naming: not every physician accepts workers’ compensation, so injured workers can struggle to find treatment at all. ## What to do if you are hurt at work The first days set up everything that follows, and the steps are simple. ## Three mistakes that weaken a claim Not reporting the injury makes the claim harder to establish, and harder still the longer it waits. Delaying treatment lets a company argue the injury happened somewhere else, was made worse by something outside work, or was not that serious. And shading the truth to a doctor, about the pain or about how the injury happened, undermines the medical record the whole claim depends on. Tell the doctor the truth, completely, at every visit. ## How long you have to file a workers comp claim in Louisiana They are shorter than most people expect. Under [La. R.S. 23:1209](https://www.legis.la.gov/legis/Law.aspx?d=83443), a claim for compensation is barred unless, within one year after the accident, the parties have agreed on payments or a formal claim has been filed. Where payments have been made, the period runs from the last payment instead, and it is longer for supplemental earnings benefits and for medical benefits. Where an injury does not show up right away, the year runs from when it develops, but in no case can proceedings start more than three years after the accident. The table below sets out the main periods. ## How a compensation claim gets resolved Because benefits are paid as they accrue rather than accumulating, resolving a claim is really a question about future exposure: what is reasonably still owed, and what that is worth in today’s money. In larger claims the firm brings in the people who can prove it. A vocational rehabilitation counselor establishes what work remains realistic given the restrictions. A life care planner meets the treating physicians and documents what ongoing treatment will cost. An economist converts those figures to present value, accounting for medical costs tending to outrun general inflation. ## When there is a second claim as well Compensation is generally the exclusive route against an employer, but it does not account for everyone who might be responsible. A driver who strikes your company vehicle at a red light is not your employer, and that situation can support a separate claim running alongside the compensation claim. It is one of the first things the firm looks for, because the two claims are governed by different rules and the second one is easy to miss when the first is already underway. Where an injury ends a working life, a [Social Security disability claim](https://www.taddalaw.com/practice-areas/social-security-disability/) can run alongside the compensation claim as well, and Louisiana law addresses how the two benefits interact. ## Louisiana deadline Louisiana delictual actions are subject to a liberative prescription of two years, commencing from the day the injury or damage is sustained. Authority: La. Civ. Code art. 3493.1, as enacted by Acts 2024, No. 423, section 1, effective July 1, 2024. ## Common questions ### Can I bring a claim if the injury was partly my own doing? Yes, in most cases. Workers’ compensation does not turn on fault. The question is whether you were injured in the course and scope of your employment, meaning on the clock and doing your work. That is very different from an accident claim, where your own share of fault can reduce or bar recovery. ### How long do I have to file a workers’ compensation claim in Louisiana? Generally one year from the accident, unless payments have been agreed or made. Under La. R.S. 23:1209, where wage benefits have been paid the period runs from the last payment, and where an injury develops later it runs from when it develops, but never beyond three years from the accident. Medical benefits have a three year period from the last payment. ### Is the first week of workers’ compensation paid? Not at first. Under La. R.S. 23:1224, no compensation is paid for the first week after the injury. If the disability lasts two weeks or longer, that first week is paid after the first two weeks have passed. ### What if my workers’ compensation treatment is denied? A denial is not the end of it. Louisiana provides a dispute process through the Office of Workers’ Compensation Administration, with defined routes for challenging a denial of recommended treatment. Which route applies depends on what was denied and why, so bring the denial letter and the treating physician’s recommendation to the first meeting. ## Contact - Firm: The Tadda Law Firm - Address: 4660 O'Neal Lane, Suite A, Baton Rouge, LA 70817 - Phone: (225) 756-0007 (accepts calls and texts) - Toll free: (800) 487-5562 - Email: info@taddalaw.com - Hours: Monday to Friday 08:00 to 17:00. Saturday and Sunday closed. - Consultations: Free same-day consultations, one on one with an attorney. - Google rating: 5.0 from 311 reviews. --- This page is general information, not legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney client relationship. Past results do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome in any future case.