Were You Fired After Filing a Missouri Workers Compensation Claim?

Our experienced Missouri work injury attorney can help protect your legal rights if you are experiencing employer retaliation.

The workers’ compensation system can be tricky for a worker to navigate. When a worker suffers injury in the workplace and has to stay off work for a long time, their employer may fill the vacant position to keep things running smoothly. This can make the injured worker feel insecure, because they may wonder what will be awaiting them once they return to work. Some workers are scared that their employer will fire them for being careless and getting injured at work. If you have suffered a workplace injury, and you were fired before you could file a claim, you may wonder if you can still recover benefits.

Can I Be Fired for Filing a Missouri Workers Compensation Claim?

Legally, no employer is allowed to fire an injured worker or they can face a lawsuit for retaliation. Typically, the employer will put the injured worker on light duty to accommodate the injury if possible. In some cases, the injured worker may be placed on permanent leave from a job due to a long term injury. In such cases, it is generally acceptable if the employer hires someone else to fill the position.

If an employer fires an injured worker while they are out of work on workers compensation, they are required by law to prove that the worker was fired due to misconduct and it had nothing to do with the workplace injury. The employer must also prove that other workers could also be fired for the same misconduct and the termination is not due to restrictions placed on the injured worker.

It may also happen that the workplace injury surfaces only after the employee has been fired. In this case, the worker may still be eligible for workers compensation benefits despite the fact that they are no longer employed. However, it can be very challenging to get workers compensation after you have been terminated. It is therefore extremely important that the worker maintains a good record of all the injuries to support their claim. The worker must prove that they have an injury or disability and that the injury occurred at work, and while working within the scope of their job responsibilities.

Such claims are quite obviously very complicated and hard to prove because employers have various grounds to deny workers compensation claims after a worker’s termination. The claim becomes particularly complicated if a lot of time has passed between the termination and a claim. The employer can contend that the injury is not work-related and occurred due to worker’s purposeful negligence or it occurred outside of the workplace.