When does workers’ comp start paying in California? The first check, every two weeks, and the settlement

When does workers’ comp start paying? The answer in days

Every payment has a due date, and every due date is counted from something you can write down.

The answer most people find first is only the first step. Search for when workers’ comp starts paying and you will mostly read about the three-day waiting period and the 14 days. Both are real, and they decide the first check. But a claim pays for months, sometimes years, and every payment after the first has its own due date too: the next temporary disability check, the first permanent disability check, and the settlement.

Four due dates, in order:

• The first temporary disability check. Within 14 days after your employer learns of the injury and of the disability that keeps you from working, unless the claim has been denied before then.
• Every check after it. Every two weeks, on the day set with the first payment.
• The first permanent disability check. Within 14 days after the last temporary disability check, with exceptions where your employer offers work at 85 to 100% of what you earned before.
• A settlement. Paid after a judge approves it. The state’s Compromise and ReleaseC&R — Compromise and Release A lump sum that closes future medical treatment permanently. form counts 30 days from the date of approval.

Medical care does not wait for any of it. Treatment is a separate benefit with its own clock. Up to $10,000 of treatment must be authorized within one working day after you file the claim form, whether or not the claims administratorClaims administrator / adjuster The person handling your claim for the insurer or self-insured employer. has decided the claim. A check can be weeks away while the doctor’s visits are already covered.

The first 30 days after a work injury, clock by clock How the claim process works

The three-day waiting period, and when it is paid after all

Three days off are unpaid only if you are back quickly and were never admitted.

The rule. No temporary disability is payable for the first three days after you leave work because of the injury. That is the waiting period, and it is often paid after all.

The two ways it disappears. If your disability lasts more than 14 days, or you are hospitalized as an inpatient, temporary disability is payable from the first day, back to the day you left work. The three days are erased, not postponed. An overnight admission is enough; so is a doctor’s note that keeps you off work through day 15.

What it means in practice:

• Off work for ten days, never admitted. You are paid for days four through ten. The first three days are not paid.
• Off work for three weeks. You are paid for all of it, the first three days included, because the disability lasted more than 14 days.
• Admitted to the hospital on the first night. You are paid from the first day, however short the time off turns out to be.

Medical care has no waiting period. The three days apply only to the checks that replace your wages. The treatment for the injury is owed from the start.

Temporary disability: the rates and the waiting period

The first check: 14 days from what your employer knows

The clock starts when the employer learns, not when a claims examiner opens a file.

The rule. The first payment of temporary disability is due within 14 days after the employer has knowledge of the injury and of the disability, the time off work that the injury causes. The Division of Workers’ Compensation’s own guidebook puts it the same way: the first payment is due within 14 days after your employer learns that your doctor says you cannot do your usual job for more than three days, or that you were hospitalized overnight, and that no other work at your usual wage has been offered.

Knowledge, not paperwork. The 14 days do not start when the claim form reaches the insurance company, or when a claims examiner first opens the file. They start when your employer knows. Telling a supervisor counts. That is why the date you told someone at work is the first date to write down, and why it is worth telling them in writing, with the date.

The letter with the first check. With the first payment, the claims administrator must also send you a letter explaining how the amount was calculated. That letter is where the average weekly wage appears, and it is the most common place for a mistake: overtime, a second job, bonuses and tips belong in the wage, and are often left out.

How much the check is. Temporary disability is two-thirds of your average weekly wage, between $264.61 and $1,764.11 a week for a 2026 injury. The rate is set by your date of injuryDate of injury For a cumulative or occupational disease claim, the law sets it as when you first suffered disability and knew or should have known it was work-related — not when the wear began. Almost every deadline runs off this..

How much is temporary disability? The 2026 rates

When the claim is delayed: the letter, the 90 days, and the money in between

A delay must be explained in writing, and it cannot last forever.

The delay letter. If the claims administrator cannot decide within 14 days whether the claim is covered, it must send you a written delay notice within that time, saying what it is waiting for. If it is still undecided later, more letters are due. A denial notice is due within 14 days of the decision to deny.

The 10% does not reach a properly delayed first check. The automatic increase for a late payment has narrow exceptions, and one of them is for the first payment while the claims administrator is still determining whether temporary disability is owed and has sent you that delay letter. A delay with a letter is not, by itself, a late check. A delay with no letter is a different matter.

The 90 days. A delay usually lasts no longer than 90 days, and it cannot last indefinitely: if the claim is not denied within 90 days after the claim form is filed, the injury is presumed covered, with limited exceptions. The guidebook says it plainly: in most cases, the claim is considered accepted.

If the claim is accepted after a delay. The temporary disability owed for the weeks you were already off work does not disappear. It is owed back to the start, and on a long delay it can arrive as one retroactive payment. Check that payment against the weeks it covers, and against the rate. If it is paid two or more years after the injury, temporary total disability is computed at the rate limits in force on the day it is paid.

The money in between: State Disability Insurance. If the claim is delayed or denied, you can apply to the Employment Development Department for State Disability Insurance. If the workers’ compensation claim later succeeds, EDD is repaid from it. It is a bridge, not extra money, but it is money in the weeks when nothing else is coming.

Workers’ comp claim denied? From the letter to the judge My claim was delayed

How often workers’ comp pays: every two weeks, on the day set by the first

The first check sets the day. Every check after it keeps the same day.

The schedule. After the first payment, temporary disability is paid every two weeks, on the day designated with the first payment, for as long as you are owed it. The day is set once and then it binds. If the first check came on a Monday, the next is due two Mondays later, and every one after it on the same rhythm.

When the amount changes. If you go back to modified work at lower pay, temporary partial disability pays two-thirds of the difference between what you earned and what you earn now, on the same schedule. If the check goes up, down or stops, you are owed a written benefit notice explaining why.

A late check is ten percent more, automatically. Any temporary or permanent disability payment that misses its day is increased by 10%, and it is to be paid to you without your asking for it. It is frequently not added. A check more than 14 days after the last is the simplest test there is.

Every check, written down. For every check, write four things: the date it was issued, the date you received it, the period it covers, and the amount. Envelopes and deposit records show the dates. Those four columns are what proves a late check, and nobody but you receives them.

The 10% the law adds to a late check, by itself

When temporary disability ends: the first permanent disability check

Two weeks after the last temporary disability check, the next kind of check is due.

When it ends. Temporary disability stops when you go back to work, when a doctor finds you permanent and stationaryP&S / MMI Permanent and Stationary / Maximum Medical Improvement. Your condition has plateaued — not that you are healed. Temporary disability ends here., meaning your condition has reached a plateau and what remains can be measured, or when you reach the 104-week limit within five years of the injury.

The next check is due within 14 days. If you have a permanent disability, the first permanent disability payment is due within 14 days after the last temporary disability payment. It is paid every 14 days after that. These payments are advances against the permanent disability you will be awarded or settle for, paid before anyone has agreed on the final rating, and they count against it.

The exception for work at your wage. If your employer offers you work that pays at least 85% of your wages and benefits, or you are already working at 100% or more of what you earned before, the advances can wait. In that case, the state’s guidebook says, the permanent disability is not paid until a judge approves a settlement of your case.

The check is usually smaller. Permanent disability is two-thirds of the same wage, but between $160 and $290 a week, figures frozen since January 1, 2014. A worker whose temporary disability was $600 a week will usually see $290. The weeks it lasts are set by the rating, not by the wage.

A gap is not the system thinking. If temporary disability has ended and more than 14 days pass with no permanent disability check, and no letter saying why, the payment is late on a schedule the law already wrote, and it carries the same 10%.

Workers’ comp checks stopped? Why they end, and what comes next How long does workers’ comp last? Four clocks

The settlement check: from signatures to approval to the money

Nothing is paid on a settlement until a judge approves it, and the form counts from that day.

Two kinds of settlement, two kinds of payment. In a Compromise and Release you take a lump sum, and future medical care for the injury is bought out and closed. In Stipulations with Request for AwardStips — Stipulations with Request for Award An agreed percentage paid over time, with future medical left open, and reopening available within five years of the date of injury. These are not two prices for the same thing. you agree on the permanent disability percentage, and it is paid to you every two weeks, with future medical care left open. The first is one check. The second keeps the two-week schedule going until the weeks run out.

A judge has to approve it first. No settlement is valid until a workers’ compensation judgeWCJ Workers’ Compensation Judge. Decides your case. There is no jury. approves it, and the judge must decide that it is adequate, not merely that both sides signed. The Appeals Board confirmed that in Gaines v. ABM Aviation, an en banc decision of 2026. Signing is not the end. Approval is.

How long approval takes. Realistically, several weeks from agreement to approval. Where both sides have signed, the settlement can be walked through, presented directly to a judge for approval rather than waiting on the calendar, which can take days instead of months.

The 30 days on the form. The state’s Compromise and Release form, paragraph 7, says that interest under the Labor Code is included “if the sums set forth herein are paid within 30 days” after the date of approval. Read plainly, the form treats 30 days from approval as the time to pay without interest owed on top. A settlement paid later than that carries interest, and an unreasonable delay can support a penalty.

What comes out before you are paid. The attorney’s fee, which a judge approves; liens; advances already paid; and sometimes Medicare’s interests. That is why the check is often smaller than the number in the agreement.

Why is the settlement check smaller? Liens and deductions, line by line A workers’ comp settlement offer, read line by line

One injury, every check dated

An illustrative case, counted from the morning she told her supervisor.

The facts (illustrative). The housekeeper was hurt on Monday, March 3, 2025, and told her supervisor the same morning. Her doctor took her off work that day. Her average weekly wage was $900, so her temporary disability rate was $600 a week, two-thirds of it, and each two-week check was $1,200. Her permanent disability rate was $290 a week, the maximum, so each two-week check was $580.

The waiting period. She was off work for 30 weeks, far more than 14 days, so the first three days were paid along with the rest. They were in her first check.

The first check. It was due within 14 days of March 3, so by Monday, March 17, 2025. It arrived that day, with the letter explaining how $600 a week was figured from $900.

Every two weeks. The next check was due on Monday, March 31, and every second Monday after that. Fifteen temporary disability checks of $1,200 came on that rhythm. The fifteenth, on Monday, September 29, 2025, was the last: her doctor had found her permanent and stationary.

The first permanent disability check. It was due within 14 days of the last temporary disability check, so by Monday, October 13, 2025. Ten checks of $580 followed, every two weeks, through February 16, 2026, each an advance against her settlement.

The settlement. She settled by Compromise and Release. Both sides signed, it was walked through, and the judge approved it on Wednesday, February 25, 2026. Thirty days after that approval was Friday, March 27, 2026: the date by which the form’s terms have the lump sum paid with the interest it already includes. The advances already paid counted against it.

What would have changed it. Had she been back at work in ten days without a hospital stay, the first three days would not have been paid. Had the claim been delayed, a delay letter would have been due by March 17 instead of a check, with the back pay owed once the claim was accepted. Had the hotel offered her work at her full wage after she was permanent and stationary, the permanent disability advances could have waited until the judge approved the settlement.

When a check does not come

A missing check is a date that passed, and the law has already priced it.

The automatic 10%. A temporary or permanent disability payment that is not made on time is increased by 10%, paid without application. You do not have to petition, prove anything or ask, and it is very often not added. If a late check arrives for the bare amount, it is short.

Up to 25%, or $10,000, for an unreasonable delay. Where payment of compensation is unreasonably delayed or refused, a judge can increase the amount delayed by up to 25% or up to $10,000, whichever is less, reduced by any 10% already paid on the same payment. It has to be litigated, and it reaches medical treatment and mileage as well as checks.

Two years, from the due date. A claim for that larger penalty must be brought within two years from the date the payment was due, not from the day you noticed.

What to do this week. Write to the claims administrator, dated, saying which check is missing and when it was due, and keep a copy. A written request removes “we did not know” from the defense, and an employer that finds its own delay may correct it with a self-imposed 10% within 90 days.

Late payments and penalties: the 10% you are owed automatically

When you do not need a lawyer for this

Counting the due dates is something you can do yourself.

You can count most of it. The day you told your employer is a date you know. The first check sets the day of the week. A calendar does the rest. If your checks come on their day, for the right amount, and your settlement is paid soon after it is approved, you may not need anyone to tell you when workers’ comp pays.

The state answers questions for free. The Division of Workers’ Compensation’s Information and Assistance officers help workers who do not have a lawyer, including with a missing payment.

When a consultation is worth having. When 14 days have passed with neither a check nor a delay letter; when the claim has been delayed toward 90 days; when the first check’s wage leaves out overtime or a second job; when checks keep arriving late without the 10%; when permanent disability has not started weeks after temporary disability stopped; or when you are about to sign a settlement and want to know when the money will come. A consultation with this office costs nothing, and if there is nothing to gain, we will say so.

When you don’t need a lawyer, and what changes the answer

A file for the payment dates:

• The day you told your employer — The date, the name of the person, and a copy of anything in writing.
• The first benefit letter — The one that explains how your weekly amount was figured, with the wage it used.
• Every check — The date issued, the date received, the period covered and the amount.
• Every delay or benefit notice — What the claims administrator was waiting for, and why any payment changed or stopped.
• The permanent and stationary report — The date it was received, and the date of the last temporary disability check.
• The settlement papers — The title on the first page, and the date of the judge’s approval.