Return To Work When There is No Work To Return

Some injuries are so bad that you just cannot place the worker back in the job they were previously doing.

This means that now you have to find work for this person. You look at what skills they may have, along with their educational benchmarks and industry experience. This can be a very involved and costly aspect of the claim.

I will get in to some tips on how to navigate this process in a minute, but before I start what about those workers that cannot return to work because no light duty is available? Maybe they have a broken leg or arm, or just went through a shoulder surgery. You may have a small shop, and the light duty work is just not there to sustain a worker for a period of weeks to months.

The Longer a Worker Is Out of Work Is the Longer a Worker Is Out of Work

Traditionally, you just paid the worker their work comp pay and got ready to return them to whatever job they were doing before they were injured. Statistics show that the longer a worker is at home out of work, the longer it takes to get them back to work. With that being said, the goal should be to limit their total wage loss as much as you can. But there is only so much you can do if there is no work this person.

Fast forward to today and what I am seeing is a lot of employers going to an outside vendor to find interim work for the injured worker until they have a full duty release. The bridge that crosses this gap is to utilize local non-profit groups for work. A lot of this work can be done at the pace of the injured worker. It can be done sitting down, it can be done one-armed if need be, and this work can accommodate a lot of restrictions. Many non-profits link up with employment companies in order to find a workforce. Even if temporary, they can still fill a need. The reemployment company will charge a flat fee for finding work for your injured party, and then they will bill the file whatever “wage” they are paying the worker to work for the charity or non-profit until they can return to their normal job. In the end, it is only a fraction of what you would pay a worker to just sit at home and recover, and it keeps the injured worker working in some capacity.

Many Employers Utilizing Vendors to Place Employees at Non-Profits

This form of a return to work program is especially of benefit for longer-term cases. In the case of someone coming off of a spinal surgery or an involved shoulder repair, they could be unable to work at their normal employer for 4-6-8 months or longer. The carrier still has to pay a partial wage loss benefit, but it is not like you will be paying the person to sit at home and let the weeks go by. Oftentimes during injury recovery, the best thing a person can do is to get off of the couch and go to work, even if it’s not their regular job at their regular employer. You set the tone that they are going to be doing something in some capacity, and they are not going to be on an extended summer vacation while they rehab from whatever procedure they had.

The workers are also getting a good social benefit of helping a charity or other non-profit. This can provide a good mental aspect to the overall recovery of the worker, and most importantly it allows them to feel like they are still giving something to society even while they are in the recovery phase. I like this new trend, and I think you will be seeing more and more carriers utilize this tool to help with overall recovery.

Use Vocational Rehab For Workers Prohibited From Ever Returning to Previous Job

Now let us consider the worker that cannot go back to the job they held before their injury. That welder cannot weld anymore, and will probably never weld again. So what do you do to resolve this issue?

First of all, you have to get a vocational counselor involved in the claim soon after you know that the worker will never return to their previous job. Even if the worker cannot work at that time, the framework has to be established before they can even start looking for work. The voc person has to sit down several times with the worker to find out what job experience they have, how it can benefit another employer, and what other options are available in their local economy.

This can also involve retraining, going back to school, or becoming certified in another field in order to become gainfully employed once again. This would happen later on in the medical recovery of the worker, but the framework can be established early on. The longer you wait to initiate this process, the longer it is going to take to find them a job—especially one that is in their original wage earning capacity. Just the research aspect of figuring out what you can and cannot do takes quite some time.

Exhaust Every Avenue Prior to Settling the Claim

If all of this fails, you may have no other choice but to settle the claim. Sometimes there is just no way around it. This will not be cheap, but it is what it is. If you have exhausted every other avenue, then you may have no other choice.

Before you arrive at that decision, exhaust every avenue you have. Consult local vocational experts, local legal counsel, and try the non-profit route. You may be able to settle that claim based on their partial loss of wage earning capacity, instead of their full loss of wage earning capacity. Every worker has the ability to earn some sort of wage, and your job as adjusters is to get the right fit for the right worker. Nobody said this is an easy task, and chances are these claims are going to be your biggest challenge.

Author Michael B. Stack, CPA, Principal, Amaxx Risk Solutions, Inc. is an expert in employer communication systems and part of the Amaxx team helping companies reduce their workers compensation costs by 20% to 50%. He is a writer, speaker, and website publisher. www.reduceyourworkerscomp.com. Contact: mstack@reduceyourworkerscomp.com.

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