CLAIMANT’S REQUEST FOR RECLASSIFICATION BASED UPON A CHANGE IN CONDITION FILED AFTER THE EXPIRATION OF CLAIMANT’S CAPPED INDEMNITY BENEFITS WAS NOT UNTIMELY (THIRD DEPT).
The Third Department, reversing the Workers’ Compensation Board, determined claimant’s request for reclassification based upon a change in condition was not untimely:
“The Board’s unilateral position that a permanently partially disabled claimant must seek reclassification prior to the exhaustion of his or her permanent partial disability award runs in direct contravention to the plain language of Workers’ Compensation Law § 15 (6-a), which provides that, subject to limitations not relevant here, ‘the [B]oard may, at any time, without regard to the date of accident, upon its own motion, or on application of any party in interest, reclassify a disability upon proof that there has been a change in condition'” … . Thus, the Board improperly refused to consider the three C-27 forms that were submitted by claimant’s physicians because they were filed shortly after the expiration of claimant’s capped indemnity benefits. Accordingly, claimant must be provided with an opportunity to seek reclassification based upon each and every one of the C-27 forms that were submitted by his physicians, irrespective of whether they were filed after the expiration of his indemnity benefits, as well as any additional, current medical evidence and/or testimony in support of his request for reclassification … . “If, after further development of the record, claimant is reclassified, there would at that time be no bar to him receiving, for example, retroactive permanent total disability benefits from the date when he was found to have been totally disabled” … . Matter of Phillips v Milbrook Distrib. Servs., 2021 NY Slip Op 06402, Third Dept 11-18-21