What is a 19(b) petition for immediate hearing?
We have mentioned a few times in this blog about 19(b) petition's for immediate hearing, but haven't clearly stated what it is. Simply put, a 19(b) petition is the way that you can get immediately in to court if you are owed benefits that are wrongly denied.
Usually your case appears for status before an Arbitrator every 60 days or so. So if your case is on the July status call, the next time you can ask the Arbitrator for a trial date is September. By filing a 19(b) motion, we can get your case on to the next hearing date which in this example would be August.
A normal trial motion has the Judge decide every issue in your case, including what it is worth. A 19(b) decides just some of the issues such as whether or not you are owed TTD benefits, whether or not the insurance company has to pay for your surgery or if your case is in fact work related at all.
Many work injury lawyers in Illinois file 19(b) petitions, but few actually go to trial on them. This is usually because they haven't prepared their case. For example, to go to trial your lawyer needs to secure all of your medical records and possibly take a deposition of your doctor or the company IME doctor. This takes organization and preparation and is the number one reason why you should file a case formally before a problem occurs. Otherwise your attorney is scrambling and it can take months to get your case ready for trial.
If your benefits are being denied unfairly, you should insist that your lawyer get the case ready for trial and file a 19(b) petition. It should almost never take more than 30-60 days for that to happen. We've had calls from people whose benefits haven't been paid for more than a year and they've never been to court. That's just lazy lawyering, plain and simple.
We are workers' compensation attorneys that help people with Illinois work injuries anywhere in IL via our statewide network of attorneys. Contact us and we will answer your questions or find the right lawyer for your situation.
