In Georgia, a settlement is an agreement with the insurance company to give up the workers’ compensation case you are pursuing and instead receive a direct monetary payment. Basically, the insurance company agrees to buy your workers’ compensation case from you. If you agree to enter into a settlement with regards to your workers’ compensation case, then that settlement is actually final.
According to Lawyers.com, the settlement usually involves the insurance company or their attorney preparing some paperwork called a stipulation of an agreement. That’s the document that will actually settle your workers’ compensation case. Sometimes there are other documents that the insurance company will send, possibly wanting to settle other cases that they may have with you or other potential cases that you may have.
The stipulation agreement is usually the workers’ compensation settlement. Those documents, if you have an attorney in your case, will usually be reviewed by your attorney and may be revised somewhat. There may be some changes that your attorney wants to make in what the insurance company sends to you.
Once those changes are made, and if there is agreement on those changes, then the documents will be reviewed by you, and signed. Once they are signed by you, they are sent back to the attorney for the insurance company. That attorney signs them. Then they have to be sent to the State Board of Workers’ Compensation. In Georgia, the State Board of Workers’ Compensation has to review and approve any workers’ compensation settlements. Without their approval, you cannot settle a workers’ compensation case.
This article does not offer legal counsel.