FELA Lawsuit Funding Explained
If you are in the railroad company, or you are building a career in the railroad, then you must have known the long hours of working and hazardous environment you need to work in. Other than providing high wages to their employee’s railroad companies know that they are more prone to accidents.
Therefore to protect the rights of employees of railroad company certain rules and rights are placed under FELA, which is the Federal Employers Liability Act. The FELA act assures that injured railroad workers get the opportunity to file a case against the company to get appropriate compensation for the mishap that happened in the company.
Most of the time when an accident occurs, the railroad company gives a certain amount to the employee as compensation but, in actual the anticipated values are much higher than what the worker gets. Hence it compels the injured worker to file a FELA lawsuit and demand appropriate compensation from the company.
The potential of FELA settlement
No one can quantify the amount which can cover the damage that happened to a railroad worker. No set of formulas can be applied to estimate the damage. But under the assurance of FELA, plaintiffs can recover most of the economic losses due to the accident. Further for non-economic losses, like the death of loved ones, damaged bones, trauma, amputations, etc was further decided by the judge or jury to get a final number for compensation. More medical care and time you take to recover more will be the compensation amount for sure.
Some factors that can play an important role in calculating the damages.
- Medical Expenses (Past and Future)
- Lost of Wage
- Pain and suffering
You will get the maximum compensation if there are none of your faults, but in case, the accident happened due to your negligence then the compensation amount can decrease substantially.
Most of the time plaintiff opts for a settlement loan if they have no savings to keep the lawsuit ongoing. And its common in the USA that lawsuit takes time to settle, therefore you may ask
How Long it takes for the FELA case to settle
None of the FELA cases can be treated equally, everyone of them differs from each other, hence the time taking is also going to be different for the settlement of cases. But on average, FELA cases take months in fact a year or two to settle.
Trial, filing, refilling of cases take most of the time. A plaintiff must prepare themselves financially to survive for two years or even more in the wake of getting compensation. Taking FELA lawsuit loans is a great way to receive some compensation amount earlier even without the settlement, and pay them back after receiving the compensation amount afterward.
In such a way neither do you lose any of the savings, nor you have to worry about the repayment because it is not a bank loan but structured settlement funding against expected compensation.