Florida Workers Compensation Lawyer
You were hurt at work, and now your employer’s insurer is the one deciding what you get. We can take it from here. Call 954-522-5800 for a free consultation. You pay us nothing unless we win. We have won these claims for Floridians from the Keys to the Panhandle, and we work them from five offices between Fort Lauderdale and Fort Myers.
Under Fla. Stat. § 440.185 you must advise your employer of the injury within 30 days, and failure to do so bars a petition except in defined circumstances. Tell them in writing and keep a copy. A verbal mention to a supervisor who later does not remember it is the most common way a genuine claim is lost.
Winning workers compensation claims for Floridians for more than thirty years
A workers compensation claim arrives at a hard time, usually while the bills are still coming in and nobody has told you what happens next. You do not have to work it out on your own. The attorneys in this photograph have won these cases across Florida since 1993, from the Keys to the Panhandle, and one of them will handle yours from the first call to the last check.
Call 954-522-5800 for a free consult and a trial lawyer will tell you today whether you have a case. You pay us nothing unless we win, and we work from five offices between Fort Lauderdale and Fort Myers.
Meet the attorneys →What Florida law does with a workers compensation claim
The carrier picks the doctor, decides what is covered, and can stop your checks while you wait. Meanwhile the rent is due, the light duty you were promised does not exist, and nobody has mentioned that somebody other than your employer may also owe you. Sorting out both claims is what we do, from the first call.
Workers compensation is a trade. You give up the right to sue your employer and to be paid for what the injury actually cost you, and in exchange you get medical care and part of your wages without having to prove anybody was at fault. Below is what that system pays, what it does not, and the separate claim that frequently matters more than the compensation case does.
A Florida workers compensation claim pays medical care and part of your lost wages without you having to prove your employer did anything wrong. It does not pay for pain and suffering. Report the injury to your employer within 30 days, and file any petition for benefits within two years.
The three deadlines on a Florida work injury
Three deadlines run on a work injury and they are all different. Missing the first is the one that costs people their claim.
Thirty days to tell your employer
Fla. Stat. § 440.185 requires an employee to report an injury to the employer within 30 days of the injury, or of the date a physician says the injury is work-related. It is the single most common reason a valid claim is denied, and it happens because people work through it, hope it settles down, and only report it when it does not.
Report it in writing, to a supervisor, and keep a copy. A verbal mention to a colleague is not a report and will not be treated as one.
Two years to file a petition for benefits
Fla. Stat. § 440.19 requires a petition to be filed within two years of the date the employee knew or should have known that the injury arose out of work performed in the course and scope of employment. That is not always the date of the accident, which matters for injuries that build up over time.
One year from the last payment or the last treatment
The same section provides that payment of any indemnity benefit, or the furnishing of treatment, care or attendance, tolls the limitations period for one year from that date. So a claim can stay open long past two years while benefits are being provided, and can close a year after they quietly stop.
That is the trap. Benefits are not formally denied, they simply cease, nobody says anything, and a year later the claim is gone. Diary the date of the last payment or the last authorized visit.
Two years on the separate claim against anybody else
Where somebody other than the employer contributed to the injury, that is an ordinary negligence claim on its own timetable under Fla. Stat. § 95.11, and the compensation case does nothing to protect it. People lose that claim entirely while their compensation case is still running, which is the most expensive mistake in this practice.
Who else can be made to answer, beyond the employer
The compensation claim is against your employer's carrier and it is not a lawsuit. The claim that pays for what the injury actually cost is against somebody else, and finding out whether one exists is the first thing worth doing.
- The employer, who is normally out of reach. Fla. Stat. § 440.11 makes workers compensation the exclusive remedy: the employer's liability under the system is in place of all other liability. That immunity is the whole bargain, and it is why an injured worker cannot simply sue the company they work for.
- The employer, in the narrow case where immunity does not hold. Fla. Stat. § 440.11 removes the immunity where the employer commits an intentional tort, which requires clear and convincing evidence that the employer engaged in conduct it knew was virtually certain to cause injury or death, and that the employee did not know of the risk because the danger was not apparent and the employer deliberately concealed or misrepresented it. The bar is deliberately very high and cases meeting it are rare.
- An employer with no coverage at all. The same section lets an employee who was not covered elect to claim compensation or to bring an action at law instead. Where an employer failed to insure, that election is a real and valuable choice and it is made with advice rather than by default.
- Another contractor on the site. Construction is the clearest example: several companies working the same site, and the one whose crew caused the injury is not your employer. That is an ordinary negligence claim with ordinary damages, and it exists alongside the compensation case rather than instead of it.
- The owner or occupier of the property. Where the injury came from the condition of a site rather than from the work, the party that controlled the site is answerable. Delivery drivers, service technicians and anyone whose job takes them onto other people's premises are hurt this way constantly.
- The manufacturer of a machine, tool or vehicle. A guard that was never fitted, a control that fails, a ladder that collapses. These claims are proved from the item itself, which means it must not be repaired, returned to the supplier or scrapped, and that has to be said in writing in the first week.
- A driver, where the injury happened on the road. Somebody injured driving for work has a compensation claim and a claim against whoever caused the crash. The second is usually worth far more, and the compensation carrier will want repaying out of it.
How a Florida workers compensation case actually runs
A compensation case runs through its own system, with its own judges, and it looks nothing like an injury lawsuit.
- Report it, in writing, within 30 days. To a supervisor, describing what happened and what hurts, and keep a copy. Everything after this step depends on this step having been done.
- The employer or carrier chooses your doctor. Fla. Stat. § 440.13 puts the choice of treating physician with the employer or carrier rather than with you. Seeing your own doctor instead, without authorization, regularly means those bills are not paid and that treatment is not part of the record the case is decided on.
- You get one change of physician, and it is worth using well. The same section gives an employee, on written request, the opportunity for one change of physician during treatment for any one accident, and requires the carrier to authorize an alternative physician not professionally affiliated with the previous one within five days of receiving the request. Where the carrier misses that window, the choice can pass to the employee, which is a reason to make the request in writing and keep proof of when it was sent.
- Benefits start, or they do not. Medical treatment is authorized and wage benefits begin, or the carrier denies the claim, disputes that the injury is work-related, or accepts part of it. A denial is not the end of anything; it is the point at which the case starts.
- A petition for benefits is filed. Setting out exactly what is being asked for: a specific treatment, a specific period of wage benefits, a particular physician. Compensation cases are litigated benefit by benefit rather than as one claim.
- Mediation, which the system requires. A mediation is scheduled on the petition, and a substantial share of disputes resolve there. It is quicker than the equivalent stage in a civil case, and it is where most contested treatment gets authorized.
- A final hearing before a judge of compensation claims. No jury, a specialist judge, and a decision on the specific benefits in dispute. Appeals go to the First District Court of Appeal, which handles these for the whole state.
- The separate claim runs in parallel, in a different court. Where a third party contributed, that case proceeds as an ordinary injury action with its own deadline, its own discovery and its own jury. Running both properly at once is most of the value a lawyer adds on a serious work injury.
What workers compensation actually pays, and what it leaves out
This is where people are most often surprised, and it is better to know at the start than to find out at the end.
Medical care, directed by the carrier
Fla. Stat. § 440.13 covers medically necessary treatment, care and attendance for the work injury, provided through physicians the employer or carrier authorizes. What is covered and who provides it are both decided within the system rather than by you.
Part of your wages, not all of them
Fla. Stat. § 440.15 sets temporary total disability at 66 and two-thirds percent of the average weekly wage, with a higher rate for certain severe injuries for a limited period, and temporary partial disability calculated on the shortfall in earnings. Temporary benefits are capped at 104 weeks.
So a third of the income is gone from the first week, and it stays gone. That gap is the practical crisis in most of the cases we see, and it is worth planning around rather than discovering.
Impairment benefits after you reach maximum improvement
Once the treating physician says you are as good as you are going to get, an impairment rating is assigned and benefits follow from it. Where somebody cannot work at all permanently, permanent total disability exists, and it is difficult to establish and worth establishing properly.
Nothing at all for pain and suffering
The compensation system does not pay it. Not a reduced amount, none. The same is true of the loss of the ability to do the things you used to do outside work. That is the price of not having to prove fault, and it is why the claim against a third party matters so much.
What the third-party claim adds
An ordinary negligence claim covers the full range: all medical care past and future, the whole wage loss rather than two thirds of it, lost earning capacity, and pain and suffering. Fault is divided under Fla. Stat. § 768.81 and a person more than 50 percent responsible for their own harm recovers nothing, which does not apply inside the compensation system at all.
The carrier gets repaid out of that claim
Where a third-party case recovers money, the compensation carrier has a right to be repaid what it laid out. How much it actually gets is negotiable and it is affected by how the recovery is structured, which is a reason for one firm to be running both cases rather than two firms running one each.
What changes from one part of Florida to another
The statute is statewide. What differs is the work, and Florida's work is not the same from one part of the state to another.
Construction, and the number of companies on one site
Building work concentrates where growth is, and a single site carries a general contractor, a dozen subcontractors, equipment suppliers and delivery firms. That is the best set of facts in this practice for finding a claim outside the compensation system, and it is the reason a site injury deserves a proper look rather than a compensation form.
Hospitality, agriculture and the road
Hotels and restaurants produce lifting and fall injuries at scale, agricultural work produces machinery and chemical injuries in the interior counties, and an enormous number of Florida workers are hurt driving for work. The last of those almost always carries a second claim.
Work on or near the water is a different system entirely
Seamen, dock and harbor workers and some offshore work fall under federal schemes rather than under Florida workers compensation, with different rights and different deadlines. Where somebody's job involves a vessel or a port, that question gets asked before anything is filed.
A proven record, anywhere in Florida
Our five offices run from Fort Lauderdale to Fort Myers, and we act statewide on work injuries and on the claims that sit alongside them.
The insurance behind a Florida work injury
Two different kinds of insurance sit behind a work injury, and they behave nothing like each other.
The compensation carrier, which is not on your side
It pays benefits the statute requires and disputes the rest. Adjusters here decide what treatment is authorized and which physician you see, and they are measured on what a claim costs. Nothing about that is improper and all of it is worth understanding before you rely on their account of your rights.
Where the employer had no coverage
Most Florida employers must carry it, and some do not. Fla. Stat. § 440.11 then gives the employee a choice between claiming compensation and bringing an action at law, and the second removes the immunity that would otherwise protect the company. Whether an employer was insured is a matter of public record and it is checked at the start.
Misclassification, which is common and matters
Workers are regularly told they are independent contractors when the way they actually work says otherwise. What decides it is control over the work rather than the label on the paperwork or what somebody signed, and getting it wrong costs a worker the whole claim.
The third party's liability insurance
The other claim runs against ordinary liability coverage: a contractor's policy, a property owner's, a driver's, a manufacturer's. Fla. Stat. § 627.4137 requires disclosure of the limits of each known policy including excess and umbrella layers, in a sworn statement, within 30 days of a written request, and on a serious injury that letter goes early.
Your own health insurance, and why it refuses
Health plans exclude work injuries, so a claim denied by the compensation carrier frequently gets refused by the health plan as well, and somebody who is genuinely hurt ends up with neither paying. Getting the compensability question resolved is what unlocks treatment, and it is a reason to bring in a lawyer at the denial rather than months afterward.
The claim most injured workers never hear about
What comp gives you, and what it withholds
Workers compensation covers authorized medical treatment and a portion of lost wages without anyone having to prove fault. That is the bargain. The other half of it is the exclusive remedy doctrine: you generally give up the right to sue your employer, and comp pays nothing at all for pain and suffering.
For a minor injury that trade is often fine. For a catastrophic one it can leave an enormous gap between what the worker lost and what the system pays.
Where a third party claim comes from
The exclusive remedy protects the employer, not everyone else. Fla. Stat. § 440.11 puts comp in place of all other liability to the employer, and it stops there. If another driver hit you while you were working, if a subcontractor on the site created the hazard, if defective equipment failed, or if a property owner let a dangerous condition stand, that party can be sued in an ordinary injury claim.
That claim runs alongside the comp case and does compensate pain and suffering. It is routinely missed, because the comp adjuster has no reason to raise it and the worker has no reason to suspect it exists.
The two overlaps that come up constantly: crashes and falls
Two situations account for most of the missed claims. The first is a crash while working: driving between sites, running an errand for a supervisor, delivering, or making a service call. Comp covers that crash because it happened in the course of employment, and it pays no matter who caused it. The driver who caused it is a stranger to the comp system, and the ordinary auto claim against them is untouched by it.
The second is a fall on a property the employer does not own. A worker sent to a client site, a warehouse, a store or a rental unit is a business visitor there, and the owner of that property owes them what it owes anybody else. The comp carrier pays the medical bills and part of the wages. The property owner answers for the hazard, and for the pain, the loss of future earning capacity and everything else comp does not touch.
The tell in both is simple. If the person who caused it does not appear on your paycheck, there is a second claim to look at.
What the comp carrier gets back, and why it is negotiable
Fla. Stat. § 440.39 is explicit that you may take comp benefits and pursue the third party at the same time. The price is that the employer or its carrier is subrogated to what it paid, so a share of any recovery goes back to it.
The share is not simply everything it spent. Where you do not recover the full value of your damages, and almost nobody does, the statute gives the carrier a percentage of what it paid equal to the percentage your net recovery is of the full value of your damages. That formula is the whole of the fight in a great many cases: establish that the full value was far higher than the settlement, and the lien comes down accordingly. A worker settling a third party claim without anybody running that calculation frequently hands back money they were entitled to keep.
The section also carries a trap in its timing. The right to sue is yours for the first year, and after that the carrier may bring the action itself on 30 days notice. If the carrier has not brought it within two years of the claim accruing, the right of action reverts to you. Nobody sends a reminder when the first year runs out.
Who would handle your case
Your case is handled by one of the trial lawyers below, and you will know which of them has it from the first conversation. They do workers compensation work week in and week out, they will tell you what your case is worth and why, and they will be straight with you about the parts that are hard.
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Richard P. Pravato Founding & Managing Attorney Board Certified in Civil Trial Law by The Florida Bar since 2004, and by the National Board of Trial Advocacy. Injury cases exclusively since 1996. Full profile → -
Brett J. Yonon Senior Trial Attorney Selected to Florida Super Lawyers in 2024 and 2025. Brett Yonon is who this firm puts on a catastrophic injury or a death in the family, and he has tried those cases to verdict. Full profile →
Workers Compensation questions we are asked
Can I sue my employer for a workplace injury in Florida?
Usually not. Workers compensation is the exclusive remedy against an employer, which is the trade-off for benefits paid without proving fault. Narrow exceptions exist. The more productive question is usually whether someone other than your employer contributed to the injury, because that claim is not barred.
My claim was denied. What now?
A denial is not the end. You file a Petition for Benefits with the Office of the Judges of Compensation Claims, and there is a two-year deadline from the date of injury to do it. Denials are frequently reversed, and the reasons given are often procedural rather than substantive.
Do I have to use the doctor my employer chose?
Within the comp system, treatment generally has to be authorized, and the carrier directs care. There are procedures for requesting a change of physician, and they have their own timing requirements. This is one of the areas where an unrepresented worker most often loses ground without realizing it.
Questions that apply to any Florida injury claim, fees, deadlines, recorded statements and shared fault, are answered on our injury claim FAQ. What we have recovered is on recent case results.
Five Florida offices
We take workers compensation claims statewide. Each market below has its own page on this claim, with that office's address, its direct number and the court a case there is filed in.
Fort Lauderdale workers compensation claims
2101 W Commercial Blvd, Fort Lauderdale. Serving Broward County.
View →Miami workers compensation claims
1111 Brickell Avenue, Miami. Serving Miami-Dade County.
View →West Palm Beach workers compensation claims
2101 Vista Parkway, West Palm Beach. Serving Palm Beach County.
View →Boynton Beach workers compensation claims
1375 E Gateway Blvd, Boynton Beach. Serving Palm Beach County.
View →Fort Myers workers compensation claims
1825 Colonial Blvd, Fort Myers. Serving Lee County.
View →Other claims we handle
Three of the closest to this one. The full list is on our Florida practice areas page.
Tell us what happened
A lawyer will listen, tell you what Florida law does with those facts, and be straight with you about whether it is worth bringing. If it is not, we will say so.
We take cases anywhere in Florida.