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What If I Can’t Get A Lawyer To Take My Case?

We hear this question quite a bit.  Unfortunately, our Workers’ Compensation Law has, for several decades, been pretty unfair to working folks.  Many disputed workers’ compensation claims are either hard to win, provide insufficient benefits to the employee, if won, or both; creating an unfortunate situation wherein a fair number of hard working Arkansans simply can’t find a lawyer willing to take their case.  Although having a lawyer isn’t absolutely necessary in a workers’ compensation claim, folks who proceed without one ultimately run the risk of getting run over and overwhelmed by the insurance company and its attorney.  The system allows a claimant to proceed without a lawyer, in a pro se capacity, and our Administrative Law Judges always go out of their way to be helpful in this regard.  However, judges can’t serve as your attorney, and they are legally bound to hold an injured worker to the burden of proving his case, regardless of whether he has counsel or not.  At Hart Law, we fight hard for working folks and we’ve been known take cases other lawyers either don’t want or haven’t handled very well and then returned to the client.  If you’re having difficulty finding a lawyer to take or keep your case, give us a call.  We’d be privileged to visit with you about your options.

Neal L. Hart, Attorney at Law

Many Thanks To Our Clients

Many Thanks To Our Clients

At Hart Law, we really like our clients.  They’re good, hard working folks who we genuinely enjoy getting to know as we’re helping to guide them through their workers’ compensation claims.  Without our clients, there would be no Hart Law.  We go the extra mile because we’re privileged to have such great people to represent, and we’re eternally grateful for their business and support.  Thanks for being a part of the Hart Law family.

Neal L. Hart, Attorney at Law

Loss of Future Earning Capacity in Arkansas Workers’ Compensation Law: What Happens If I Get Injured and Then Can’t Get a Good Job?

Of all the benefits available to injured workers under our Workers’ Compensation Act, this is one of the most valuable.  Unfortunately, insurance companies rarely pay out wage-loss disability benefits voluntarily.  In fact, in order for the insurance folks and their lawyers to ever pay what they owe in this regard, they basically have to be forced to do so.  Needless to say, it becomes very difficult for an injured worker acting alone in a claim to get this done.

If an employee suffers an injury that causes disability to the body as a whole (usually neck, shoulder, hip, back, skin and/or head); the injury qualifies for an impairment rating under the AMA Guides; and the employee has permanent work restrictions making it so he or she can’t return to previous employment, that employee is entitled to ask a Workers’ Compensation Judge for an award of benefits based upon a loss of future earning capacity.  As a simple example of how this could work, if a diesel mechanic making $20.00 an hour suffers a back injury; gets a 10% whole-body impairment rating; is assigned permanent, light-duty work restrictions; and is only able to get a job that pays $10.00 an hour, a Judge might find that the employee in this example has suffered wage-loss disability of 50%, since he or she is only able to make half of the pre-injury wage.  This can add up to some big bucks, really fast.

If you’ve had a work injury and think you’re going to have to take a pay cut, give us a call.  We’d be happy to visit with you and give you honest, real, straightforward advice on how you may be able to make a wage-loss disability claim.

Neal L. Hart, Attorney at Law

Foot Injury Claim?

We successfully resolved a couple foot injury claims recently, so I thought I’d write a short workers’ compensation foot injury blog.  I don’t think there’s much dispute over the fact that on-the-job foot injuries are particularly devastating to working folks.  Obviously, if it becomes difficult to simply stand and walk, it’s also very hard to perform a job while not being able to stand or walk very well.  Secondly, feet are made up of many, many different bones, joints, tendons, muscles and ligaments; all working together to allow folks to move.  When one part of this complex structure is injured and has to be fixed, it is often quite difficult for doctors to patch things back together like they were before.  It commonly takes months and months for an injured worker to heal following a foot injury; while they’re receiving a whole bunch of medical care and are usually quite depressed about their situation.

Insurance companies know that foot injuries can be quite expensive to pay for and, as a consequence, they sometimes try to manipulate the medical treatment in order to try to end the claim fast and just leave the injured worker hobbling around for the rest of his or her life.  Please do not let this happen in your foot injury claim.  With the right assistance, from an experienced and well-respected workers’ compensation team like Hart Law, there is light at the end of the tunnel.  We fight hard in these feet claims, and we’re with our clients every painful step of the way, in order to make sure they return to good health and get every benefit that our Workers’ Compensation Law offers in these types of cases.

Have questions about a foot injury claim?  Please feel free to give us a call, anytime.

Neal L. Hart, Attorney at Law

Workers’ Compensation and Personal Injury

Most of the time, a employee injured at work has only one path to recovery – our Workers’ Compensation Act. Unfortunately, our Exclusive Remedy Doctrine bars injured workers from suing their employers for negligence. If you’re hurt at work, then workers’ comp is what you get. Unless there is a negligent third party involved in the scenario. One of the most common examples of this is when an injured worker is involved in a car or truck wreck while on the job. If the wreck was caused by the negligence of another driver, then the injured employee potentially has a workers’ compensation claim and a personal injury case, both arising out of the same accident. A skilled workers’ compensation lawyer, working alongside a skilled personal injury lawyer like Terry Dugger, Of Counsel to Hart Law, can use the workers’ compensation case to build the personal injury case, and ultimately maximize the value of both.

If you think your workers’ compensation claim may also involve a personal injury case, feel free to give us a call to discuss your options, anytime.

Neal L. Hart, Attorney at Law

Communicating With Clients In Workers’ Compensation Claims

Arkansas Rule Of Professional Conduct 1.4 states that lawyers shall “reasonably consult with the client” and  “keep the client reasonably informed” about the status of his or her case.  It goes on to require that lawyers “promptly reply to reasonable requests for information” from their clients and to “explain a matter to the extent reasonably necessary to permit the client to make informed decisions regarding the representation.”

In other words, visiting with your clients about their workers’ compensation cases and letting them know what’s going on.  Giving them timely and sound legal advice.  Patiently discussing their options, with an understanding of the temporary strain that our workers’ compensation system puts on injured workers’ lives, and on the lives of their family members.  Explaining complicated legal issues in a way that folks who don’t have a law degree can understand.  Taking an interest in clients and conversing with them like a person, and not like a cash cow.

At Hart Law, we take a great interest in our clients and their cases.  We consider ourselves privileged to be able to represent folks involved in workers’ compensation claims, and we really like what we do.  We don’t talk to our clients a bunch just because the Rules Of Professional Conduct make us do it; we actually enjoy visiting with working folks, and we always speak in a language that makes sense.  When clients call us about their claims, we know who they are and what’s going on with their case.  We know this, because we work on our cases frequently and with relentless attention to detail.  When our clients ask us to do something related to their case, we do it; usually immediately.  At the end of the day, we’re just normal, hard working, down-to-earth people, just like the folks we represent.

Lawyers should actually want to do all of this, but, unfortunately, some of them don’t do it very well.  If you’ve been injured at work and think you might like some help from a law firm that spends a lot of time communicating with its clients and enjoys doing it, we’d be glad to visit with your about your case, any time.

Neal L. Hart, Attorney at Law