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When you are injured while working on a railroad for a railroad company, you do not have a traditional Illinois workers’ compensation claim. You can bring something called a FELA case which stands for Federal Employer’s Liability Act. It’s essentially work comp for people involved on the railroad.
The key point in this is you have to be under the control of the railroad. In other words, they have to be your employer. In many instances, companies like BNSF and others hire temp workers through a staffing agency. These people might work at a rail yard, but they are not railroad employees and not under the control of the railroad.
This often involves workers doing things that can be best described as railroad support. Maybe they work in an office or do some maintenance or operating a hosteler or some other machine that is found on the railroad. They might even wear a badge that says BNSF that they are given for property and Homeland Security reasons.
But if they are simply subcontracted out by the railroad from a staffing service and get injured, then they have a regular workers’ compensation case, and not a FELA case. That is in part because the staffing agency pays their wages and can hire/fire them.
Because of this, if they are injured due to the negligence of an actual railway employee, if they get hurt on the job, they can pursue both a work comp case and a personal injury lawsuit.
Or as in the case of a worker who recently called us after accidentally falling out of their truck, they would just have a work comp case. That is still a big deal as it will pay for 100% of their medical care, all of their time off of work and eventually we will be able to get a settlement for them.
The reality is that firms who handle FELA cases do not typically do regular work comp cases and vice-versa. We only handle regular Illinois work comp claims, but do refer FELA cases to some top firms. So the bottom line is that if you were injured while working on a railroad in Illinois, we can either help you or point you to a firm that can. Any lawyer we would recommend for you would be the same we would suggest to family members or friends.
Final tip. These staffing agencies can be especially awful to their employees in work comp cases. They will lie to you or break the law and not regard your health at all. To many of them, you are just a name and number and once you can no longer work the job for their client, all they care about is finding someone else. They do not get to break the law or deny you benefits. So do not trust what they say and be prepared to push back on their often illegal actions.
