A lot of 2013 for my family has been taken up by leaping though hoop after hoop (with a shattered leg) after a bad accident, that was avoidable, at work. I won't lie, OH&S was something that I have always considered a bit over the top, causing employee and employer time spent on unnecessary paperwork. I could always see the practical side of it, but mostly saw it as replacing common sense and courtesy that I stupidly thought most people had.
Though out the process we have been made feel like common criminals out to get any dollar we can after delaying our return to work and later when we attempted to quit. Information, besides a list of obligations are extremely limited and there does not appear to be any law protecting employees from employers that bully and manipulate the employee. What are other peoples thoughts and experiences?

Bec welcome to the real world.
Sorry but that is the truth of the matter.
As an ex Union official I watched as both work industry and roads trauma events saw massive down grades in injured persons pay outs and medical assistance.
No way around another truth fraud in claims, including an under ground within a migrant community that faked cars smashes both to receive the insurance and a pay out for injury's.
As is so often the case we swung the pendulum too far in fixing these problems.
I by the way left out Ambulance chasing Lawyers who fed on the industry.
Unions confronted State governments and in truth the last Labor Federal one, but lost badly.
Current ALP supported? work cover system is based on the worst example of all the states.
Not the still poor but best one NSW.
Personal insurance in my view should be held by every worker.
And what a better world it would be if politicians and others had chased and convicted the frauds.
They remain free, folk like you are paying for their frauds.

In this instance I am going to defend the "Ambulance chasers" as I have no idea how I would have survived the last 7 months without them. I couldn't give two hoots about the amount of compensation, its all the threatening and lies that come with it. We ended up quitting and am now involved in the "Non Compliance" side of things.

Having been both a compo claimer many years ago, and a nurse working for Insurance companies at one time, I can say that I would do anything to avoid compo claims if I could.

Even after I fell over at work last year, and eventually had to have surgery, I never told anyone it happened at work.
Luckily, no one saw me fall over.

Workcover are ok if it is just a small claim, but if it drags on, they are ruthless and biased towards the employer, no doubt about it...

Sorry Bec but for me the pay out is every thing.
A workers so badly injured that work life is ended, even if only 20 would swap the cash to just return to the day before the event.
Almost every one of them will tell you that.
But while some may see every claim as false most indeed nearly all are not.
Some result in life in a wheelchair and now the NDIS seems under threat, we move further away from supporting a better life for many.
We all too often slash cut and burn rather than fix the problem.
In relation to Lawyers good ones are gold but the savage costs some took from injured party,s in part is a reason governments first looked at change

Bec_young mum of 2,

The treatment and progress of a claim depends on the support the employer gives to it. That is expressed very early. Don't rule out personality either. Bluntly, someone close to and well thought of by management is unlikely to encounter the insurer's hired guns. Those outside of the inner circle will have a rough ride.

There is a reason why certain professionals are the preferred 'independent' assessors on the insurer's panel.

The world is not a fair place.

Belly, "No way around another truth fraud in claims, including an under ground within a migrant community that faked cars smashes both to receive the insurance and a pay out for injury's"

You grasp a very prickly nettle there. I cannot remember a time when migrants from certain countries didn't have a scam going. Far too sly for the Aussies. Not PC to mention any of it though. Housos gets away with blunt satire, but limited to injury and disability pensions.