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A Denied Claim and the Job Search Requirement

OWCP has denied your claim for wage loss compensation, and you are thinking about appealing the denial decision or you have appealed. While an appeal is pending, OWCP expects a claimant to seek employment. If your claim is eventually accepted and your medical condition found to be work related, you may need to show OWCP that you sought work within the physical or psychological limitations determined by your treating doctor. If you can’t, you may not be eligible for retroactive wage loss compensation.

This requirement has a touch of craziness to it and is applied unevenly by claims examiners, but nevertheless it is important to plan ahead in case your claims examiner deems a work search a factor of wage loss eligibility. Your plan would have two steps.

ONE Your treating doctor needs to document contemporaneously your ability to work. Contemporaneous means at the time in question. For example, if in March 2010 you were unable to work, the work slip or chart note signed by your doctor should be dated close to March 2010, not in October 2010 after you’ve won your appeal. I suggest that every time you see your doctor you ask him to write out a work slip or enter into a chart note that you can’t work at all or can work only if the job doesn’t require heavy lifting, for example, or isn’t stressful, for example. Consider asking your doctor to fill out a work capacity evaluation form OWCP-5c (for musculoskeletal conditions), an OWCP-5a (for psychological conditions), or an OWCP-5b (for cardiovascular/pulmonary conditions). You can print out those forms from the link to the OWCP forms page on the FECA page of this website.

TWO If your doctor thinks you can work at some occupation, engage in a job search. There’s no requirement that you become employed, but, as if you were meeting eligibility requirements for unemployment compensation, keep a record of applications submitted, resumes sent out, employers contacted, etc.

Of course, if you find a new job that pays less than the federal job on which you were injured, OWCP upon acceptance of your claim will pay you the difference between your old and new wage. Of course, the new job must meet your wage earning capacity.

February 2010

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