If you’ve been hurt while working for a railroad company, you may have already heard from a claim agent. This person may sound friendly, helpful, and even reassuring. They may tell you that you can just sit back and relax while they take care of everything. They might even go so far as to tell you that you don’t need to consider retaining a railroad lawyer because they will continue paying your wages and will treat you fairly. Hiring a lawyer, they may argue, will “just take money from your own pocket.”
But what this agent won’t tell you is that their job is not to protect you—it’s to protect the railroad company. And they won’t tell you that a Congressional G.A.O. study from decades ago showed that lawyers averaged getting three times more in compensation for workers than workers who represented themselves.
Railroad injuries affect thousands of workers each year across the country. According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, railroad employee injuries remain a significant concern despite ongoing safety improvements. When these injuries occur, claim agents become the railroad company’s first line of defense, stepping up to protect that company’s financial interests.
At Shapiro, Washburn & Sharp, we’ve represented hundreds of railroad workers across Virginia and beyond who have been injured on the job. Our deep experience is matched by peer-reviewed recognition: We are a Tier 1 “Best Law Firm®” for railroad worker injury law, which shows the trust our peers and clients place in our ability to hold railroads accountable and secure justice for injured workers. One of our attorneys has twice served as chair of the largest plaintiff’s railroad injury lawyers association in the USA and has attended national seminars where lawyers representing injured rail workers have exchanged current trends and strategies on maximizing worker settlements and verdicts.
Knowing the truth about how railroad claim agents operate is your first step toward protecting yourself. We explain more about that below. In the meantime, if you or a loved one was hurt while working for a railroad company, call our FELA injury lawyers and railroad accident attorneys today at 833-997-1774 for a free consultation.
What Is a Railroad Claim Agent?
A railroad claim agent is the railroad company’s version of an insurance adjuster. Their job is to investigate workplace injuries, speak to employees, document accidents, and manage claims. What’s important to remember is that these agents are not neutral. No matter what they may tell you, they are direct employees of the railroad.
That means their interests are tied to the company’s bottom line. Everything they do will be measured against a single standard: Did they minimize the railroad’s financial exposure? If so, they did a good job, regardless of what that means for your medical or financial recovery. Their salary, bonuses, and career advancement will all depend on keeping settlements as low as possible or even eliminating them entirely.
The Trust-Building Strategy: What Agents Know But Won’t Tell You
Railroad claim agents are trained in developing rapport with injured workers. They have actually gone through programs that teach them how to gain your trust, and that doing so is essential to protecting the railroad company’s bottom line. Here’s what happens behind the scenes that they’ll never tell you.
They Promise to “Help” You
The first thing the agent will try to do is make you feel comfortable enough to hand the process over to them. They’ll assure you that they can “handle it for you” and that you don’t need a lawyer, as they promise “to be fair.” They’ve been taught how to express genuine concern, and will employ tactics like frequently using your name and positioning themselves as someone who wants to “make things right.” They may even suggest that involving an attorney will only complicate matters, cost you money, and delay your recovery.
Then They Conduct Conferences Behind Your Back
If you fall for this “trust me” game, while you’re home relaxing, the claim agent will be working behind the scenes with the railroad’s law department, litigation managers, and defense attorneys, not to help you, but to build a strong defense strategy for the railroad company.
During these discussions, the railroad team will be analyzing every aspect of your case, looking for ways to do all of the following:
- Deny liability by claiming you caused your own injury
- Minimize the severity of your injuries so they don’t have to pay so much
- Argue that pre-existing conditions are responsible for your current problems
- Recreate the accident to figure out ways to say it was your fault, and make little or no effort to preserve evidence
- In many cases, secretly have railroad police surveil you, or hire investigators to do the same thing
- Find procedural defenses that could absolve them of any obligation to pay
In other words, what appears to be support is actually surveillance and strategizing to counter your potential claim. The agent is working away in the background, documenting evidence in a way that protects the railroad, not you.
They Work Quickly to Secure Evidence—for Their Side
You may believe that the evidence will support your side of the argument no matter what. But in truth, evidence often disappears. Track conditions change, equipment is repaired without first photographing evidence of the damage or condition that existed when you were hurt, witnesses forget details, and records are conveniently misplaced if they help the worker’s side.
The railroad claim agent will act quickly to gather photos, speak with co-workers, and make sure the railroad has the evidence it needs to protect itself, but just try to get that evidence without an attorney! Who will be working on these things to support your side of the case? If you hire Shapiro, Washburn & Sharp, we will.
When you contact us early on in the process, we interview witnesses and secure vital evidence while memories are still fresh. We get photos and video footage before the scene or equipment changes.
Will the Railroad Company Agent Be Honest?
Railroad operations are governed by extensive federal safety regulations enforced by the Federal Railroad Administration. These regulations affect everything from track maintenance and signal systems to employee training and equipment maintenance. If an accident occurs and an employee is hurt, violations of these regulations can establish the railroad’s liability. Workers cannot keep up with all the relevant regulations, and even railroad lawyers cannot memorize them all.
When we investigate a case, we often find evidence showing that the railroad company acted negligently when it came to ensuring your safety. Will the railroad agent uncover the same evidence? They may, but they won’t tell you about it.
In fact, railroad claim agents rarely, if ever, disclose when a railroad company violated a safety regulation. Whether it was a failure to follow safety rules, properly train employees, or report careless acts by another employee, these acts won’t come to light unless you have a legal team working on your behalf. The railroad agent may become aware of these things, but they will keep quiet about them.
Without experienced legal counsel on your side, you may never know that an important rule or regulatory violation was a key factor in your injury.
Perhaps most importantly, a railroad claim agent will never check into your medical condition and its long-term or permanent consequences. You might think they would care about how much your injury is affecting your life, but remember, they are not working for you. They won’t call your doctors to understand what future medical care you’ll require, or to ask their opinions about the future consequences, and they won’t examine the full impact of your injury on your financial condition either.
When we represent railroad workers, we always consult with their treating physicians to understand the full scope of our clients’ injuries. To present clear evidence in your case, we may also work with experts to create illustrations that clearly show what has happened to you so that it’s understood how impactful it is.
Claim agents also ignore the economic side of your loss. Maybe your injury is preventing you from returning to your railroad career, so it’s not just about your immediate medical expenses. It’s also about lost wages, benefits, and retirement contributions. We will work with you to calculate all of these losses and present them as part of your claim. A railroad agent will never do this, as they don’t want the company admitting to more financial responsibility than they want to bear.
How a Railroad Accident Attorney Can Help
Despite their promises to help, railroad claim agents are not advocating for you, and having an experienced railroad accident attorney on your side levels the playing field. Without that representation, you are relying on the railroad to define what is “fair” when it comes to your compensation, which is a dangerous gamble when they care only about minimizing payouts.
If you’ve been injured while working for a railroad, contact us right away for a free consultation. We’ll help you understand your rights so you can make informed decisions as to how to proceed, as we did for a railroad conductor who suffered a back injury that required him to give up his job as conductor. We helped negotiate a $330,000 settlement on his behalf. We have also obtained multi-million-dollar verdicts and settlements against railroads such as CSX, Norfolk Southern, Amtrak, and many settlements against short-line railroads as well.
You can find our offices in Virginia Beach, Norfolk, Portsmouth, Suffolk, Hampton, and Chesapeake. For more information on what railroad claim agents won’t tell you, see our report below.