Get a Free Consultation

    By checking this box, you agree to receive SMS text messages from Abdi & Associates Inc., you can reply stop to opt-out at any time. By providing your phone number, you consent to receive automated informational/conversational SMS communications from Abdi & Associates, Inc. Message & data rates may apply and frequency will vary. Reply STOP to unsubscribe. Text HELP for help. Privacy Policy | Terms of Use. SMS opt-in or phone numbers for the purpose of SMS are not being shared.

    Short answer: if you were hurt at work anywhere in California, workers’ compensation pays for your medical treatment and part of your lost wages regardless of who was at fault, and it pays a permanent disability award if the injury leaves lasting impairment. You must report the injury to your employer within 30 days and file a claim within one year. If someone other than your employer caused the injury, you can also sue that person or company. Abdi & Associates, Inc. represents injured workers before the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board throughout California, from the first claim form through settlement or trial, and handles Social Security Disability in-house when an injury ends a career. Attorney fees are set by the workers’ compensation judge and paid from the award, so there is no attorney fee up front.

    Who is covered

    Nearly every worker in California is covered. Every employer with at least one employee must carry workers’ compensation insurance or be approved to self-insure (Labor Code section 3700). Full-time, part-time, seasonal and temporary employees are covered from the first day of work. Immigration status does not matter: Labor Code section 1171.5 extends every state labor protection, including workers’ compensation, to all workers regardless of status. See our page on workers’ compensation for undocumented workers.

    The main exclusions in Labor Code section 3352 are sole proprietors and partners who have not elected coverage, certain domestic workers who are related to the employer or work fewer than the minimum hours, people who work only for aid such as room and board, and some volunteers and amateur athletes. Independent contractors are not covered, but California’s ABC test (Labor Code section 2775) presumes that a worker is an employee unless the hiring company proves the worker is free from its control, does work outside the company’s usual business, and is customarily engaged in an independent trade. Many workers labeled “contractors,” including drivers, delivery workers, construction laborers and gig workers, are employees under this test. A worker hired by an unlicensed contractor for work that requires a license is an employee of that contractor as a matter of law (section 2750.5), and if the employer is uninsured, benefits are available through the Uninsured Employers Benefits Trust Fund (sections 3706 through 3716).

    What workers’ compensation pays

    Medical treatment

    The insurer must provide all treatment reasonably required to cure or relieve the effects of the injury (Labor Code section 4600), with no deductible or co-pay and no dollar limit. That includes emergency care, doctor visits, surgery, physical therapy, medication, medical equipment, prosthetics, chiropractic and acupuncture within statutory limits, home health care when prescribed, and mileage to appointments. Treatment normally runs through the employer’s medical provider network (MPN), and treatment requests are subject to utilization review, with denials appealable through independent medical review. Our medical benefits page explains how to get treatment approved and what to do when it is denied.

    Temporary disability

    While a doctor keeps you off work, temporary total disability pays two-thirds of your average weekly wage, up to the maximum rate set each year by the Division of Workers’ Compensation (section 4653). If you can work reduced hours or a lower-paying job during recovery, temporary partial disability pays two-thirds of the wage loss. Payments start after a three-day waiting period unless you are hospitalized or disabled more than 14 days (section 4652), and are limited to 104 weeks within five years of the injury, extended to 240 weeks for a short list of serious conditions such as amputation, severe burns and chronic lung disease (section 4656).

    Permanent disability

    When your condition is permanent and stationary, the treating doctor or a qualified medical evaluator rates your impairment under the AMA Guides, and that rating is adjusted for your occupation and age into a percentage of permanent disability. Our page on what changes when your doctor finds you permanent and stationary covers what stops, what continues, and how to dispute the report. The percentage determines how many weeks of benefits you receive (section 4658). Ratings of 70 percent or more carry a life pension, and a 100 percent rating is paid for life at the temporary disability rate (section 4659). Certain injuries, including loss of both hands or practically total paralysis, are presumed totally disabling (section 4662). The insurer can try to reduce the award by attributing part of the disability to prior conditions (apportionment, sections 4663 and 4664), which is one of the most litigated issues in California workers’ compensation. See our permanent disability page.

    Supplemental job displacement voucher and return-to-work supplement

    If you have permanent disability and your employer does not offer regular, modified or alternative work within 60 days of the permanent and stationary report, you receive a $6,000 voucher for retraining, education, licensing fees, tools and related expenses (section 4658.7), and you may then apply to the state’s Return-to-Work Supplement Program for an additional $5,000 payment (section 139.48).

    Death benefits

    When a work injury is fatal, dependents receive death benefits paid at the temporary disability rate up to statutory totals that depend on the number of dependents (section 4702), plus burial expenses (section 4701).

    How a claim works

    1. Report the injury. Tell your employer within 30 days (section 5400). Same-day reporting in writing is best. Emergency care comes first; report as soon as you can afterward.
    2. Claim form. The employer must give you a DWC-1 claim form within one working day of learning of the injury (section 5401). Complete the employee section, keep a copy, and return it. Filing the form starts the insurer’s obligation to authorize up to $10,000 in treatment while it investigates (section 5402(c)).
    3. Insurer decision. The insurer has 90 days to accept or deny the claim. If it does nothing, the injury is presumed compensable (section 5402(b)).
    4. Medical evaluation. Treatment runs through the MPN. When the parties disagree about whether the injury is work related, the extent of disability, or the need for treatment, a qualified medical evaluator (QME) or, if both sides agree, an agreed medical evaluator (AME) examines you and writes a report that carries great weight with the judge (sections 4060 through 4062.2).
    5. Application for Adjudication of Claim. Filing an application with the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board opens a case and stops the one-year deadline. It is required before any dispute can be heard.
    6. Hearings. A Declaration of Readiness to Proceed asks for a hearing. Disputes over medical treatment or temporary disability can be set for an expedited hearing (section 5502(b)); disputes over whether the injury arose out of and in the course of employment are set for a priority conference when the worker is represented (section 5502(c)). Other issues go to a mandatory settlement conference and, if not resolved, to trial before a workers’ compensation judge. Decisions can be appealed to the Appeals Board by petition for reconsideration and then to the Court of Appeal.
    7. Settlement. Most cases resolve by stipulated award, which pays the permanent disability in installments and keeps future medical care open, or by compromise and release, a lump sum that closes the case including future medical care. The judge must approve any settlement as adequate (section 5001). Our comparison of stipulated awards and compromise and release settlements explains how the permanent disability rating, life pension and future medical care figure into each.

    Why claims are denied, and what to do about it

    Insurers deny claims when they contend the injury did not arise out of employment (AOE) or did not occur in the course of employment (COE), when the worker was intoxicated, was the initial physical aggressor in a fight, or was injured while committing a felony (section 3600(a)), when the injury happened during an ordinary commute, when the report was late, or when the medical evidence is thin. Many denials are made on the assumption that the worker will give up. A denial is not the end of the claim; it is the beginning of the litigation, and most denied claims that reach a qualified medical evaluator with a clear history are resolved in the worker’s favor or settled. Our page on denied workers’ compensation claims walks through the process.

    Deadlines

    • 30 days to report the injury to the employer (section 5400). A late report does not bar the claim if the employer already knew about the injury or was not prejudiced, but do not rely on that.
    • One year from the date of injury to file the Application for Adjudication of Claim (section 5405), or one year from the last benefit paid. For a cumulative trauma or occupational disease, the date of injury is the date you first suffered disability and knew, or should have known, that it was caused by work (section 5412).
    • Five years from the date of injury to reopen a case for new and further disability (section 5410).
    • One year to file a Labor Code section 132a petition if you are fired, demoted or punished for filing a claim.
    • Two years to sue a negligent third party (Code of Civil Procedure section 335.1), or six months to present a claim against a public entity (Government Code section 911.2).

    Injuries and illnesses covered

    Any injury or illness caused by work is covered: a specific injury such as a fall, a lifting injury, a machine injury or a crash while driving for work; a cumulative trauma such as carpal tunnel, back or shoulder conditions and hearing loss that develop over time; an occupational disease such as respiratory illness, skin disease, cancer from workplace exposure, or an infectious disease contracted at work; a psychiatric injury caused by work; and a compensable consequence, such as depression, sleep disorder or a second injury caused by the first. Serious injuries, including brain injuries, spinal cord injuries and amputations, involve every benefit the system offers and often a third-party claim as well. See our pages on physical injuries and repetitive motion injuries. Warehouse workers face a particular mix of forklift strikes, quota-driven lifting and heat exposure; see our page on injuries in California warehouses and forklift accidents.

    When you can sue someone other than your employer

    Workers’ compensation is the exclusive remedy against your employer and coworkers (Labor Code sections 3600, 3601 and 3602), with narrow exceptions for an employer’s willful physical assault, fraudulent concealment of an injury, a power press guard removed by the employer, and an employer that has no insurance at all. But Labor Code section 3852 preserves a civil lawsuit against any third party whose negligence caused the injury: a driver, a property owner, a general contractor, a subcontractor, or the manufacturer of defective equipment. The civil case can recover pain and suffering and full lost earnings, which workers’ compensation does not pay; the comp carrier then has a lien on that recovery and a credit against future benefits (sections 3856 and 3861). We evaluate every claim for a third-party case and coordinate the two. Our page on third-party work injury claims covers the exceptions to the exclusive remedy rule, the employer’s lien and credit, and the Privette rule on construction sites. Our construction accident and work injury pages explain how this works.

    Retaliation, job protection and Social Security Disability

    It is illegal for an employer to fire, threaten or punish you for filing a workers’ compensation claim (Labor Code section 132a), and an employer that refuses to accommodate your restrictions may be liable for disability discrimination under the Fair Employment and Housing Act. Workers’ compensation does not by itself protect your job, but medical leave laws and the FEHA often do. See our 132a retaliation page. If the injury keeps you from working for a year or more, you may qualify for Social Security Disability, which we handle in-house and coordinate with the comp settlement to limit the offset between the two. If Social Security has already denied your claim, see our page on appealing a Social Security disability denial; the appeal deadline is 60 days.

    How Abdi & Associates represents injured workers

    Abdi & Associates, Inc. represents injured workers in workers’ compensation claims throughout California, before whichever district office of the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board has venue over the claim. We handle denied claims, medical treatment disputes, QME and AME evaluations, permanent disability ratings and apportionment, penalties for late payment (section 5814), 132a petitions, settlement negotiation, and trial. We work remotely, so every step, including the consultation, signatures and case updates, is handled by phone, video and secure electronic signature from anywhere in the state. Workers’ compensation attorney fees are set by the judge as a percentage of the award, usually 15 percent or less, and are paid from the recovery, not up front. Call (888) 772-2529 or, in Spanish, (323) 310-4264. Se habla español.

    Frequently asked questions

    Do I have to prove my employer did something wrong?

    No. Workers’ compensation is a no-fault system. You only have to show that the injury arose out of and in the course of your employment.

    Can my employer fire me for filing a claim?

    No. Labor Code section 132a makes that illegal, with penalties, reinstatement and lost wages available through the Workers’ Compensation Appeals Board, and the same facts often support a separate civil claim.

    Can I choose my own doctor?

    Treatment usually runs through the employer’s medical provider network, but you can change doctors within the network after the first visit, and you may be able to treat with your own pre-designated physician if you gave the employer written notice before the injury. When the network doctor’s opinions are wrong, a QME evaluation is the way to challenge them.

    How much does a workers’ compensation lawyer cost?

    No attorney fee up front. The fee is a percentage of the benefits recovered, set and approved by the workers’ compensation judge at the end of the case.

    What is my case worth?

    It depends on your wages, the permanent disability rating, whether future medical care stays open, and whether a third-party claim exists. No one can quote a figure before the medical reports are in.

    I was hurt at work but I am undocumented. Am I covered?

    Yes. California workers’ compensation covers every worker regardless of immigration status.

    Workers’ compensation topics

    Sources: Cal. Lab. Code §§ 139.48, 1171.5, 2750.5, 2775, 3351, 3352, 3600, 3601, 3602, 3700, 3706, 3852, 3856, 3861, 4060, 4062.2, 4600, 4610, 4616, 4652, 4653, 4656, 4658, 4658.7, 4659, 4662, 4663, 4664, 4701, 4702, 5001, 5400, 5401, 5402, 5405, 5410, 5412, 5502, 5814, 132a; Cal. Code Civ. Proc. § 335.1; Cal. Gov. Code § 911.2; California Division of Workers’ Compensation, Injured Worker Guidebook.

    Reviewed by Shawn Abdi, Esq., Abdi & Associates, Inc. Last reviewed: September 4, 2026. Attorney advertising. This page is general information, not legal advice about your specific situation. Legal deadlines have exceptions; confirm the deadlines that apply to your case with a lawyer.