What If You Find Out That Your Employer Does Not Have North Carolina Workers’ Compensation Insurance?
Businesses that employ more than three or more people in North Carolina generally must carry North Carolina workers’ compensation insurance.
If they don’t, the owners can actually be hit with a felony charge and face jail time, among other punishments. Why does the state care so much about this issue? What’s the big deal?
If your employer lack proper insurance — and then you get sick or hurt on the job — how do you expect to collect benefits to pay for your lost wages, the time you spend off of work, and so on and so forth? Perhaps the business owner has personal assets to cover care. But probably not. And many workers’ comp cases in North Carolina can lead to damages in the range of hundreds of thousands of dollars.
If your employer is operating on a shoestring budget – and doesn’t have a lot of significant assets, and does not carry insurance – you may not have any recourse at all!
Then your burden becomes your family’s burden – and/or the state’s burden and/or the federal government’s burden. In other words, a simple lapse of judgment on the part of your employer can cascade to have massive impacts not just on your future and your family’s future but also on the economy in general. The rest of our civil society must pick up the tab for the incompetence.
There are a few lessons to be learned:
1. If you are an employer and you do not understand your obligations under North Carolina workers’ comp law — or if you do understand them and you still lack insurance — make it an urgent, top priority to take care of your insurance issue.
Do it not just to protect yourself from felony charges. Do it to secure the well being of the people on your teams who help you produce and also to help society at large.
2. If you are an employee, and you know that your employer has not met his insurance obligations– or other obligations with respect to your safety, financial well being, or welfare — speak up!
Don’t wait until you get hurt or sick to learn about your employer’s incompetence. It’s within your rights – and it’s commonsense – to find out whether you would be protected if something happened to you on the job. If you need more clarification, you can always connect with a resource like the North Carolina Industrial Commission or a qualified North Carolina workers’ compensation law firm.
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