A Defense Attorney's Handbook to Working With in Pro Per Applicants
| Jurisdiction | California,United States |
| Author | JEREMY D. PERKINS, ESQ. |
| Publication year | 2018 |
| Citation | Vol. 31 No. 2 |
JEREMY D. PERKINS, ESQ.
Oakland, California
Workers' compensation defense attorneys typically gather extensive experience working with the goals, requirements, and guidelines provided by corporate clients who are employers, insurance carriers, or third-party administrators. It's no revelation, then, that such attorneys might feel completely out of their element and a bit befuddled when confronted with the all-to-human and unpredictable in pro per applicant.
This article is a short guide from the perspective of one defense attorney to offer some tips on cultivating a meaningful and productive working relationship with unrepresented applicants who appear in your list of files. My hope is that by the end of this article, you'll have learned to enjoy the challenging human element presented by in pro pers.or at least overcome your fear of speaking to a real injured worker, explaining the convoluted intricacies of the workers' compensation system, and negotiating a win-win resolution that satisfies the adequacy monitoring of a WCJ.
When that litigation referral arrives in your in-box with "in pro per" noted in the description, know that communication is your key to success. The workers' compensation system can be scary and confusing for injured workers, and many laypeople might have biased preconceptions of the ruthlessness of our gentle profession. This is your chance to dispel many of those ideas by demonstrating that like everyone else, you are a person trying to do your job.
Start by contacting the applicant by letter (for their records), by e-mail (often to set up future communication), and by phone (to establish a personal connection based on trust and openness). In those communications, introduce yourself and explain your role as a representative of your clients and an officer of the court. Demonstrate that those two roles mean you have to walk the line between your corporate client's needs and the rules of good faith and fair dealing. This doesn't mean you'll roll out a red carpet for every injured worker (some may deserve your scrutiny or a jaundiced eye), but every injured worker deserves the due process the legal framework within which we function affords.
After that introduction, be sure to keep in contact by whatever method serves you both best. Remember that some applicants will be hesitant about how to proceed with their claim, while others might be riding in their third or fourth "rodeo" and insistent on action based on their understanding of the process and their desired outcome. Take each applicant as you find them and try to blend their needs with those of your client to move through the claim-handling procedure with as few hiccups as possible. In that way you are serving as a mediating factor between the parties to guide the claim forward while keeping both parties informed and aware of the direction in which you are all headed.
Henceforth and heretofore, thou shalt avoid the cumbersome and stilted verbiage with which you might have been trained in all aforementioned communications with the injured party. Simply put, speak and write plain English! Avoid legal jargon or terms your grandmother wouldn't understand (unless she was a Supreme Court Justice). Keep communication short and to the point. Make clarity of the message your supreme goal.
We work in a profession that seems to have renamed every "car" a "vehicle," every "accident" an "incident," and every "coworker" a "potential fact witness of the alleged injury." Unfortunately, when dealing with unrepresented applicants, our training in concise language and legal shorthand might confuse the applicant or breed distrust. No one likes to feel like they're on the outside of a secret brotherhood versed in a language of codes and references meant to keep the layperson at a disadvantage.
Speak to unrepresented applicants like you would talk to your neighbor when you're trying...
To continue reading
Request your trial