People of Spartanburg, SC who have been involved in a car accident often suffer from serious injuries and wage loss since they cannot work again.
Whether your injuries will take a few days or weeks to heal or you are likely to be out of work for months, calculating your lost wages becomes part of your car accident and later file a claim.
It is crucial to recover these wages towards stability in the financial aspect of healing and the fact that you deserve to be paid for the time you lost from work due to the accident.
Calculating lost wages is usually among the most sensitive processes in a car crash claim and should be handled with due diligence.
Knowledge is power in proving loss of earnings for waged and salaried earners, businesses, and self-employed people.
What Are Lost Wages in Car Accident Cases?
Lost wages assistance (LWA) are the wages that the victim would have earned had he or she not been involved in the accident and suffered injuries.
These wages are for the days that you spent in the hospital, receiving treatment, going to doctor’s appointments, or handling issues arising from the accident.
In a car accident claim, compensation for lost wages seeks to put the victim in the same position that he or she would have been if the accident had not happened. It’s important to differentiate between two key concepts: such as wages and salaries lost, and loss of earning capacity.
Lost wages are wages that you have already lost and will not be earning at the time of the incident while loss of earning capacity is wages that you may be unable to earn in the future because of permanent or long-term disability.
Both are important in car accident claims and yet lost wages are usually easier to quantify than pain and suffering. In order to recover lost wages, the person has to prove that they were unable to work due to the accident that happened.
This involves getting documents that demonstrate the days that were lost as well as the amount of money that could have been earned in those days. This is where the role of documentation in the claims process comes in as a very important factor.
Steps to Prove Lost Wages in Spartanburg
To recover lost wages after a car crash in Spartanburg then you will need to prove that you cannot work and the amount of money that you have lost. Follow these key steps to prove lost wages:
Collect the Pay Stubs and Tax Returns
The recent pay stubs and tax returns are the key papers that will demonstrate how much you usually earn. Such records are important in establishing one’s earnings before the accident as well as any bonuses or overtime.
This documentation makes it easy to determine for the salaried employees the amount of income one would have earned while practicing had one not been restricted.
Obtain an Employer Statement
Make sure you request your employer to write a statement indicating the time you were out of work because of the injuries. It is recommended that this statement should indicate the particular dates on which you were away from work and the number of hours or days that you lost.
If in your job, there were aspects such as bonuses and/or overtime, your employer should also indicate how your absence impacted such earnings.
How to Demonstrate Lost Wages for the Self-Employed
In the case of being self-employed, the process of proving lost wages may not be as straightforward as one can imagine, but it is still doable. You will be required to submit business papers such as; invoices, contracts, or bank statements to show your normal income.
Documentation of any lost projects, clients, or work opportunities that were lost due to the accident must be well documented for the claim.
Medical Certification of Your Disability to Work
You will be required to show that you lost income by presenting a medical evidence record showing that your injuries kept you from working.
A doctor’s note a detailed medical report or a certificate that shows your physical incapability which can result in some high medical expenses and the time taken to recover can add to your claim as they help in establishing a connection between your injury and lost work time.
With such documentation, you will be in a better position to recover your lost wages hence enhancing your lost wage claim.
Types of Income Included in Lost Wage Calculations
In calculating the lost wages in a car wreck claim in Spartanburg, you should be able to factor in every other form of income that you would have made had it not been for the crash.
It is not only your wages but different types of income that you would have been receiving had it not been for the injuries.
Regular Wages
Your ordinary pay is the purest part of a lost wage claim. Regardless of whether you earn an hourly wage, or you have a monthly/annual wage, this amount of money is what you would earn if you were at work, and not off from work.
Submitting your pay stubs or salary records will be evidence of the exact other regular wages you have lost.
Overtime Pay
If you normally put in extra hours of work or you were on call before the accident, you can also recover for lost overtime wages. This can greatly boost the value of your claim especially if overtime forms a large part of your income.
Evidence for this loss can be proved by documents provided by your employer, which show how often you worked overtime.
Bonuses and Commissions
For those who have some form of additional earnings such as bonuses or commissions then such forms of earnings are also considered when calculating lost wages.
If you lost sales, performance bonuses, or commissions because of your injury, you’ll need to present evidence of previous bonuses and how your absence affected your ability to earn such an amount.
Vacation and Sick Days
It is also common to find employees who take their vacation or sick days off to be away from work because of a car accident.
While this enables you to earn income while you are in the recovery process, you are still eligible for compensation for the lost benefits.
The rationalization is that you should not have been required to exhaust your personal time off due to the carelessness of another employee.
Difficulties in Estimating Lost Earnings
Even though it is essential to establish lost wages when seeking compensation for a car accident which may often result in a personal injury, it is not always easy to do so.
Some of the challenges that may be encountered include the following; this makes it difficult to determine the total amount of lost income.
If not well handled, these challenges may slow down your claim, or you receive less compensation than you deserve.
Disputed Amounts
One of the most frequent issues is the possibility of disputes concerning the amount of lost wages that have to be compensated. Employers may doubt if the time that was lost was essential or if the wages lost were proportional to your earnings usually.
Documentation is an essential factor that should be embraced to reduce the chances of the dispute, this includes medical records and statements from employers.
Variable Income
In cases where one has an untidy income stream that fluctuates from week to week such as freelancers or gig workers, or those earning on a commission basis, then establishing lost wages is even more complex.
But unlike a salaried employee where the loss is well established, where the income varies, then proof is needed. Tax returns, financial statements, and past earning declarations will assist in providing a better depiction of your normal earnings, but providers will dispute such figures.
Employer Non-Cooperation
At times, the employers may refuse to offer documentation or even confirm the specifics of the days that you were absent from work.
This may prove cumbersome especially when the employer is likely to challenge the amount of money that the employee has lost while out of work. That is why it is always good to have an attorney involved so that your employer gives you the necessary information.
Calculating Future Lost Earnings
Other difficulties include estimating future lost earnings or loss of earning capacity. This calculation involves estimating the amount of time that one will be out of work or how the injuries will impact the income-earning potential in the future.
It usually requires the opinion of vocational experts or economists, making the claim process more complicated.
If you want to know about car accidents in detail, read our blog on what to do after a car accident in South Carolina.
The Role of a Lawyer in Lost Wage Claims
Calculating and proving lost wages in a car crash case is not always an easy task and can be very time-consuming when it comes to dealing with insurance companies who may well try to lowball your claim.
This is why it is always advisable that a qualified car accident attorney from Spartanburg should be sought so that you can be fully compensated.
Gathering the Necessary Documentation
A competent lawyer will assist you in gathering all the required paperwork that may support your loss of wages such as pay slips, tax returns, employer’s testimonials, and doctors’ reports.
If one is a sole trader, then the lawyer can help gather other documents such as bills, receipts, and contracts to prove lost business opportunities.
Negotiating with Insurance Companies
Insurance firms may challenge the credibility of your lost wage claim and/or provide a low-ball settlement offer. Your lawyer will take charge of all the bargaining processes to ensure that you get the right amount of compensation as per the documents and evidence you present.
Your attorney helps to make sure that your claim is not under-compensated by the insurers given the fact that they have knowledge of the laws in your state.
Experts for Complicated Computations
In cases where a person has suffered injuries that will affect his or her earning capacity in the future, the attorney can call for the services of an economist or vocational expert who will evaluate the loss of earning capacity.
These professionals can give expert opinions or reports that can support the claim and at the same time, come up with better estimations of future lost income.
Feel free to call Max Hyde Law Firm at 864-804-6330 for a free consultation to learn, how we can help you with the lost wages claims issues.
