A common question our workers compensation unit receives relates to the payment of workers' compensation claimant attorney fees by claims administrators. With the media reporting daily about excessive attorney fee awards in other areas, concern over this issue is understandable. However, in the context of West Virginia (WV) workers' compensation, the claims administrator rarely has to pay a claimant's attorney fees.

With the convenience of the Internet, a lot of West Virginians try to save money or try new things through “do-it-yourself (DIY)” research. You can find DIY car repair, DIY arts and crafts projects, DIY home repairs, and nearly every other topic imaginable. But when it comes to estate planning, it usually best to leave that job to a will attorney in WV.

Every project comes with inherent risk. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you could make any number of errors that could result in a poorly completed project, or worse, a complete project fail. And when a project fails, you’ll likely have to pay a professional more to fix it that it would have cost to have paid for it in the first place.

The West Virginia (WV) Legislature has encouraged healthcare providers to donate their time and talents to care for indigent patients, including creating special licenses that aid qualified professionals in volunteering at free clinics, as well as providing civil immunity for that free care.  See e.g. W. Va. Code § 30-3-10a. Donated healthcare in WV works because it allows licensed professionals to donate their time caring for the poor in a clinical setting.

Employers have this funny quirk: They like to know the identities of their employees and get a bit testy when told they are wrong (it’s something to do with payroll, taxes and unions). That is why employers reacted negatively when the NLRB issued the Browning-Ferris Industries of California opinion in 2015 and created a new test for determining joint employment.

Many people know they need to have a power of attorney. Not wanting to pay a lawyer for drafting, they turn to the Internet to find a form document that will be legal where they live. Is this a safe strategy? This is a tricky question, and the answer depends on the law of the state where the person lives, although many general principles are common. To illustrate, let’s consider these issues in the context of a West Virginian who has completed a power of attorney form in WV.

This blog focuses on Internet-based powers of attorney. It is the second in a series designed to help people think through issues that often arise when considering powers of attorney. The first provides an overview of WV power of attorney laws, and the third focuses on specific power of attorney forms designed to achieve narrow purposes.