Greenville Workers' Compensation Lawyer
Workers' comp is supposed to be the simple system — no fault, no lawsuit, just benefits. Then the adjuster picks your doctor, questions your injury, and slow-walks your checks. Tom Conits handles South Carolina work injury claims from first report to hearing — and if your injury keeps you from driving, he comes to you.
- No fee unless we win
- House calls across the Upstate
- You get Tom's cell — not a case manager
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- Ελληνικά — Greek spoken
What Is Workers' Compensation?
Workers' compensation is a trade South Carolina wrote into law: if you're hurt on the job, your employer's insurance pays your medical care and part of your lost wages without you having to prove anyone did anything wrong. In exchange, you generally give up the right to sue your employer the way you could sue a stranger who injured you — which is also why, as the state's own Workers' Compensation Commission puts it, there is no recovery for pain and suffering under the Act. It pays bills and wages. It does not pay for what the injury took from the rest of your life. (Sometimes another path does — more on third-party claims below.)
Most South Carolina employers are required to carry this coverage, but not all. Under S.C. Code § 42-1-360, businesses that regularly employ fewer than four people are exempt, along with certain categories such as casual employees, most agricultural workers, and railroad employees. If your employer claims it "doesn't have workers' comp," that's the first thing worth checking — the exemption is narrower than many employers believe, and misclassifying workers to duck under the four-employee line is a story I've heard more than once.
The system is administered by the South Carolina Workers' Compensation Commission, not the courts. That matters: the paperwork, the deadlines, and the hearings all follow the Commission's rules, and the habits that serve you well in ordinary life — being patient, not making a fuss, taking the adjuster at their word — are exactly the habits that quietly shrink a comp claim.
Your injury already cost you your commute. Meetings shouldn't require one.
I personally drive to clients' homes across Greenville and the surrounding counties — hospital rooms and kitchen tables included. You were just hurt; the last thing you need is a trip to a law office.
— Thomas Spiro Conits
Workers' Comp Benefits Available in South Carolina
South Carolina workers' compensation provides three families of benefits — medical care, wage replacement, and compensation for permanent disability — plus death benefits when a workplace accident takes a life.
Medical treatment
The insurance carrier must pay for treatment of your work injury — but under S.C. Code § 42-15-60, your employer gets to furnish (and choose) the treating physician, and if you refuse the treatment that's ordered, your compensation can be suspended until you comply. Seeing your own doctor without authorization usually means the bill isn't covered. This is the single most misunderstood rule in the whole system, and it's covered in more detail below.
Weekly wage checks
If your injury keeps you out of work, you're generally owed two-thirds (66 2/3%) of your average weekly wage, capped at a maximum the state resets each year — $1,189.94 per week for accidents on or after January 1, 2026, per the Commission's published rate. Under § 42-9-200 there's a seven-day waiting period before checks begin, but if you're disabled more than fourteen days, compensation reaches back to day one. Getting the average weekly wage calculated correctly — overtime, second jobs, the works — is one of the quietest ways a lawyer earns their fee, because every future check is a percentage of that number.
Permanent disability
When you've healed as much as you're going to and something is still lost, the Act pays for permanency. Total disability runs up to 500 weeks under § 42-9-10 — and for the most catastrophic injuries, paraplegia, quadriplegia, or physical brain damage, benefits can continue for life. Partial disability (you can work, but you earn less than before) pays two-thirds of the wage difference for up to 340 weeks under § 42-9-20. Where your injury lands on that map is negotiated and fought over constantly, because it drives the value of the entire claim.
Death benefits
When a workplace accident is fatal, § 42-9-290 provides the family two-thirds of the worker's average weekly wage for 500 weeks, plus burial expenses up to $12,000. No family should have to read that statute the same week they plan a funeral. This is exactly the kind of case where I come to your kitchen table, not the other way around.
Fault Doesn't Matter: How SC Work Injury Claims Actually Work
You do not have to prove your employer was negligent. You don't even have to prove you weren't. If you slipped carrying a tray you'd carried a thousand times, lost focus at the end of a double shift, or got hurt doing the job exactly the way you were trained — it's still a compensable work injury. I grew up working in my family's restaurant, and I've been on my feet since I was fifteen; I know precisely how routine work becomes dangerous work at hour eleven. Nobody should be embarrassed to file a claim for an accident, because the entire system was designed for accidents.
What the insurance company can dispute is nearly everything else: whether the injury really happened at work, whether your back problem is "pre-existing," whether you reported it in time, whether the doctor's restrictions are legitimate. "No-fault" was never a promise that the claim would be easy. It's only a promise about which questions are off the table.
The Two Clocks: 90 Days to Report, Two Years to File
South Carolina runs two separate deadlines, and missing either can cost you the claim:
- Notice to your employer — 90 days. Under S.C. Code § 42-15-20, you must give your employer notice of the accident within ninety days. Tell a supervisor or manager — the Commission is blunt that telling a coworker doesn't count — and put it in writing so no one can later "forget." Report it the day it happens if you possibly can; late-reported claims get treated with suspicion even when they're filed within the window.
- Claim with the Commission — two years. Under § 42-15-40, a claim must be filed with the South Carolina Workers' Compensation Commission (Form 50) within two years of the accident, or within two years of a death resulting from it. There is no fee to file the claim itself. The right to compensation is barred if the deadline passes.
For repetitive trauma — the shoulder that gave out over years of lifting, the carpal tunnel from two decades on a line — the clocks generally run from the date you discovered, or reasonably should have discovered, that the condition is work-related, with an outer limit set by statute. Occupational disease claims follow their own discovery rules. If you're anywhere near a deadline, call me today, not next month: (864) 777-1000.
What to Do After a Workplace Injury in Greenville
- Report it — that day, to the right person. A supervisor or manager, in writing. A text message to your boss counts for more than a hallway conversation anyone can deny.
- Get medical care immediately. For emergencies, go — Greenville Memorial on Grove Road houses the Upstate's Level I trauma center, and nothing about workers' comp requires you to bleed while paperwork is sorted out. For non-emergency care, ask your employer where to treat, because the carrier's choice-of-doctor right starts mattering right away.
- Tell every provider it happened at work. The words "work injury" in the first medical record are worth more than a stack of affidavits a year later.
- Write down what happened while it's fresh — the equipment, the wet floor, the missing guard, who saw it. Photos if you can get them.
- Be careful with recorded statements. The adjuster's job is to shape your words into the smallest possible claim. You're allowed to talk to a lawyer first, and the consultation is free.
- Keep going to the authorized doctor. Gaps in treatment become "he must have healed" in the insurance company's file.
The Company Doctor: What You Can and Can't Do
In South Carolina, the employer's insurance carrier picks your treating physician. Not you. The Commission's own guidance for injured workers says it plainly, and § 42-15-60 backs it up: the employer furnishes the physician, and the employee "shall accept" the care that's provided. Refuse it, and your compensation can stop until you comply.
That rule has teeth, but it isn't the end of the conversation. What you should not do is quietly stop treating, self-refer to a chiropractor, or vent to the adjuster — each of those hands the carrier a reason to cut you off. What we can do is build the record: report every symptom at every visit so the file reflects your actual condition, use the second-opinion and Commission procedures available when care is genuinely inadequate, and litigate when the "treatment" is really claim management in a white coat. The company doctor's opinions also drive your impairment rating — the number much of your permanency award hangs on — which is exactly why this fight is worth having early and carefully.
Claim Denied? Here's What Happens Next
Denials arrive for predictable reasons: "not work-related," "pre-existing condition," "late notice," "no medical evidence." Read closely, a denial letter is just the insurance company's opening argument — and South Carolina gives you a forum to answer it.
You request a hearing by filing a Form 50 with the Commission's Judicial Department (a $50 hearing fee applies). The case is heard by a commissioner, who decides what benefits are owed — medical care, back checks, permanency, all of it. Decisions can be reviewed by the full Commission and, beyond that, in South Carolina's appellate courts. None of this is a courtroom drama; it's a paper-and-preparation fight where the side with the better-organized medical evidence usually wins. That preparation is my job, and the earlier it starts, the more options we have — including the option of forcing a fair settlement before a hearing ever happens.
If you're staring at a denial letter right now, don't re-read it a tenth time. Call me at (864) 777-1000 and read it to me instead — it's free, and you'll know where you stand before dinner. If you'd rather read first, I've written the whole process out — the Form 50, the appeal deadlines, and the third-party angle — in Workers' Comp Claim Denied in South Carolina? Here's What To Do Next.
Third-Party Claims: When Someone Besides Your Employer Is Responsible
Here is the part of work-injury law that too many people never hear about. Workers' comp limits what you can recover from your employer. It does not protect the other people whose negligence hurt you. Under S.C. Code § 42-1-560, you can collect workers' comp benefits and pursue a separate liability claim against a negligent third party — and that second claim can include everything comp refuses to pay, including pain and suffering.
It comes up constantly in the Upstate:
- You drive for work — deliveries, sales calls, job sites — and another driver hits you. That's a workers' comp claim and a car accident case against the at-fault driver. If it was a commercial truck, it's a trucking case with commercial policies behind it. I walk through how the two claims stack — and why the order you resolve them in decides what you keep — in Car Accident While Working: Two Claims, One Crash.
- A subcontractor from another company drops a load, backs a machine into you, or leaves a hazard on a shared site.
- A defective machine, tool, or safety device fails — a products claim against the manufacturer.
- You're injured on someone else's property while working — a delivery driver hurt by a hazard the property owner ignored.
The two claims interact: the comp carrier gets a lien on the third-party recovery for benefits it paid, and if you sit on the third-party claim too long, § 42-1-560 can even hand your right to sue over to the insurance carrier. Coordinating both claims so that you — not the carrier — end up with the most money is precisely the kind of chess a work-injury lawyer should be playing from week one. When I evaluate a workplace injury, the first question is always: who else?
Can They Fire Me for Filing?
South Carolina law says no — not for filing. S.C. Code § 41-1-80 prohibits discharging or demoting an employee because they instituted a workers' compensation proceeding in good faith or testified in one, and it gives the fired worker a claim for lost wages and reinstatement. But read the fine print the way an employer's lawyer will: the employee carries the burden of proof, the statute lists defenses (documented absenteeism, misconduct, poor performance), and the deadline to sue is one year. Employers who retaliate rarely say so out loud; they build a paper trail and call it something else. If your write-ups suddenly started the week after your injury report, keep copies of everything and tell me about it — the pattern is the proof. And if what's really stopping you from filing is that your employer is a neighbor — a small shop in a town where everyone knows everyone — I wrote Hurt at Work in Small-Town South Carolina for exactly that fear.
Work Injuries in Greenville: Where These Cases Actually Land
Greenville's economy runs on exactly the work that fills the Commission's dockets: manufacturing and distribution along the I-85 corridor, construction crews building out every corner of the county, hospital and food-service workers on their feet for ten-hour shifts. I've spent my whole life around one of those workplaces — my family's restaurant, where I've worked since age fifteen and still do. Burns, lifting injuries, floors that stay slick no matter how often they're mopped: I don't need a deposition to understand how kitchen and warehouse injuries happen, because I've watched them almost happen my entire life.
The comp claim itself is decided by the Workers' Compensation Commission rather than a jury. But when your injury includes a third-party case — the at-fault driver, the negligent subcontractor — that lawsuit is filed in the Court of Common Pleas, which for Greenville County sits at the Greenville County Courthouse at 305 E. North Street downtown, a short walk from my office at 100 Williams Street. And when the injury is serious enough that you're at Greenville Memorial on Grove Road, you don't come to me at all. I've met clients in hospital rooms, rehab facilities, and at kitchen tables across the Upstate — that's what I Come To You means, and it's not a slogan.
Photo slot: wc-greenville-courthouse
"Every client gets my personal cell number. Call or text me directly — you'll never chase a case manager."
Clients hear back from me the same day — and for emergencies, anytime.
— Thomas Spiro Conits
South Carolina Workers' Comp FAQs
Can I be fired for filing a workers' comp claim in South Carolina?
South Carolina law (S.C. Code § 41-1-80) prohibits an employer from firing or demoting you because you filed a workers' compensation claim in good faith or testified in a workers' comp proceeding. If it happens anyway, you may be entitled to reinstatement and lost wages — but the window to act is short, generally one year. Retaliation cases turn on timing and documentation, so save every email and write down every conversation, then talk to a lawyer quickly.
Who picks the doctor for a work injury in South Carolina?
Your employer — through its insurance carrier — has the right to choose your treating physician. If you see your own doctor without authorization, the bill usually will not be covered, and refusing the authorized treatment can suspend your benefits until you comply. If the company doctor isn't taking your injury seriously, don't just stop going. Call me first and we'll push back the right way, without putting your weekly checks at risk.
How much of my paycheck does workers' comp replace?
Weekly compensation is generally two-thirds (66 2/3%) of your average weekly wage, up to a maximum the state resets every year — $1,189.94 per week for accidents on or after January 1, 2026. There is a seven-day waiting period before checks start, but if you're out more than fourteen days, you're paid back to day one. The math on your average weekly wage matters enormously, because every check for the life of the claim is built on it.
What is the deadline to report a work injury and file a claim in SC?
Two separate clocks run. First, you must give your employer notice of the accident within 90 days — tell a supervisor or manager, not just a coworker, and do it in writing if you can. Second, a claim must be filed with the South Carolina Workers' Compensation Commission within two years of the accident. For repetitive trauma injuries, the clocks generally run from when you knew or reasonably should have known the condition was work-related. Miss the deadlines and the claim can be barred entirely.
My workers' comp claim was denied. What now?
A denial is the insurance company's opinion — not the final word. You can request a hearing before the South Carolina Workers' Compensation Commission by filing a Form 50 with the Commission's Judicial Department (there's a $50 hearing fee), and a commissioner will decide what benefits you're actually owed. Hearings are won with evidence: medical records, witness statements, and testimony that holds up. The sooner that preparation starts, the better.
Do I need a lawyer for a workers' comp hearing?
You're allowed to represent yourself, but the insurance company will have a lawyer, and hearings run on medical evidence, depositions, and cross-examination — not on how honest you sound. I prepare the medical proof, question the witnesses, and handle the Commission's procedure so nothing gets waived by accident. Like everything I do, it's a contingency fee: the consultation is free and there's no fee unless we win.
Hurt at work? Talk to Tom before you talk to the adjuster — free
Free consultation. No fee unless we win. If getting to an office is hard right now, Tom will come to you.
Office: 100 Williams St, Greenville, SC 29601 · (864) 777-1000