Claims Defense

Scopelitis attorneys represent employers, whether conventionally insured or self-insured, and insurance carriers, through all facets of a work injury claim from compensability determinations to litigation and appeal. Some claims have similarities that allow expedient treatment. Many claims involve unique factors that give rise to creative defenses or alternative resolutions that eliminate or minimize a claim’s cost to our clients.

We work with claims administrators, human resource managers, and risk management personnel to analyze the numerous issues that arise in worker’s compensation cases.  Some of these issues include surveillance, owner-operator/independent contractor status, proper jurisdiction, light-duty options, compensability decisions, multi-state benefit calculations, complex medical issues, and settlement, always mindful of litigation costs.

Workers’ Compensation Insurance Law

Few firms regularly practice in the specialized area of workers’ compensation insurance law. Even fewer do so within the context of the trucking industry. Our national practice attorneys know the rules and guidelines published by the National Council on Compensation Insurance and the variations of such rules and guidelines used in independent and monopolistic states. Issues regularly addressed include the following:

• Experience modification ratings
• Rating classification codes
• Proper determination of wages and premiums
• Assigned risk pool ramifications
• Proper determination of independent contractor status as it affects premium
• Jurisdictional issues that determine premium calculations
• Other regulatory issues involving the interplay between insurance law, workers’ compensation law
• Interstate operations of motor carriers

We also assist insurance carriers and employers in designing and implementing specialized insurance products, such as occupational accident insurance that address unique needs within the trucking industry.

Scopelitis attorneys regularly serve as faculty, instructing attorneys on the practice of workers’ compensation law. In addition, our attorneys present to a wide variety of trucking industry associations, including the American Trucking Associations, the Truckload Carriers Association, the American Movers Conference & Household Goods Carriers Bureau, the National Tank Truck Carriers Association, and many state trucking associations. We have also published articles in the Transportation Lawyers Journal, the Indiana Law Review, and other state and national trucking industry publications such as Transport Topics and the ATA Litigation Center’s “Transpoints.” We closely monitor bills that bear upon the business environment for motor carriers throughout the country and advise state legislatures in the conception and drafting of workers’ compensation laws.