The envelope looks official because it is. Broadspire administers workers' compensation claims for large construction insurance programs. That is the whole job. It is not the insurance carrier. It is not the Workers' Compensation Board. It is not your lawyer.
Injured on a site covered by a wrap-up insurance program? Then the packet, the MyClaim login, and the orientation video are standard issue. Large projects funnel every injury claim through one administrator. Following the packet's instructions will not hurt you. Signing pages you have not read can.
One fact never appears in the packet. Broadspire runs the comp claim only. It has no authority over a separate case against the site owner or general contractor if a safety failure caused your injury. That case moves on its own track. It is frequently where the real recovery lives.
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What Broadspire Actually Is
Broadspire is a third-party administrator owned by Crawford & Company. On a wrap, formally an owner-controlled insurance program or OCIP, the owner buys one comp policy covering every contractor on site. Broadspire adjusts claims under that policy on the carrier's behalf.
So the adjuster on the phone works for the claims operation. Not for you. Not for the state. The job is to gather facts, steer you toward network providers, and pay or contest benefits. Legitimate work. Different work from protecting your rights. Keep those two roles separate in your head from day one.
If the setup feels unfamiliar, that reflects how the project was built, not any mistake by you. The mechanics are covered in what your ADR program actually is.
The Phone Numbers You Are Looking For
Your own letter has the phone numbers you need: the direct line for your assigned adjuster. Every claim gets one.
The online portal is MyClaim at choosebroadspire.com. Login trouble goes to the Crawford Help Desk listed on Broadspire's portal materials. Broadspire also publishes a general TelePlus reporting line on its employer documents. Both are public lines. Neither knows your file by heart. Your adjuster does.
Prepare before any recorded call. State what happened, where it happened, and what hurts. Nothing more. The reporting and documentation steps that protect a claim are in what to do after a New York job site injury.
What the Packet Asks You to Sign
A medical release usually sits inside the packet. New York's comp system uses a limited release, the kind reflected in the Board's Form C-3.3. Limited means records tied to the injured body parts and claimed conditions. It should not unlock your entire medical history.
Check the scope before you sign. Ask one question of every release: which records, over what period? A release broader than the injury you reported deserves an explanation. You are allowed to get advice first. No deadline attaches to signing a release. Reporting the injury is the deadline that matters.
The Notice About MRIs and Testing
A notice in your mail may direct all diagnostic testing, including MRIs, through the carrier's testing network. That notice is Form DT-1, issued under WCL § 13-a(7). The requirement is real. So are its exceptions, printed on the form itself. Verbatim:
"6. The claimant does not have to use a network provider under these circumstances: a. The provider can't schedule the test within five [5] business days. b. The carrier has challenged (controverted) or will controvert the claim. c. In a medical emergency. d. For x-rays taken during an office visit and used for diagnosis and treatment of: fractures, possible fractures, joint dislocations, tumors, infections, loosening of surgical implants, dislocation of prosthetic joints, spinal instability, or follow-up to surgery."
The form adds two more protections. If the carrier never sent the required notice, it must pay for tests done outside the network. And reasonable travel costs to and from the network provider are reimbursable. Save the notice. Hand a copy to your doctor. Two moves that cost nothing and preserve everything.
Your Wage Checks and the Seven-Day Wait
New York pays lost wages at two-thirds of your average weekly wage, scaled to your degree of disability, under WCL § 15. WCL § 12 imposes a wait. No wage benefits flow for the first seven days of disability unless the disability runs past fourteen. Cross that line and the first week gets paid too.
A construction paycheck understates the loss. Pension credits, annuity contributions, and family health coverage all ride on hours worked. Comp checks replace none of that. This is where a third-party case earns its weight for a career injury. Run the math on the whole package, not the stub.
If the Letters Mention an Ombudsperson, or You Get Notice ADR3
Certain wrap projects push comp disputes into alternative dispute resolution under WCL § 25(2-c). Letters mentioning an ombudsperson, or a Board notice labeled ADR3 (04-14), mean your claim sits in one of these programs. The ADR3 notice says so directly, verbatim:
"Disputes and requests for medical treatment are not handled by the Board for claims that are part of an Alternative Dispute Resolution Program. Your Medical Providers should not submit requests for medical authorization (Form MG-1.0, Form MG-2.0 and Form C-4AUTH) to the Board for this claim. The resolution of any disputes and requests for medical treatment will be handled by the Alternative Dispute Resolution Program. Please contact the claim administrator for the Alternative Dispute Resolution Program with any questions regarding the handling of your claim."
Plain translation: the Board steps out, and the claim administrator steps in. Disputes run through the program's mediation and arbitration stages. Under 12 NYCRR 314.3, an arbitrator's award is final and binding. The Workers' Compensation Board does not review it. Any appeal goes to the Appellate Division, Third Department, within 30 days of notice of the award's filing. Short window. Narrow path.
About the ombudsperson: program materials describe the role as a neutral resolving disputes between labor and management. Public descriptions state plainly that the ombudsperson is not the worker's advocate. Treat the role as machinery, not representation. Conversations with an ombudsperson carry none of the protection a talk with your own lawyer does. If the packet also said you do not need a lawyer yet, read what that advice leaves out.
What Broadspire Cannot Decide
Every packet omits its most important sentence. Nothing Broadspire administers, and nothing the ADR program resolves, touches a claim under Labor Law § 240 or Labor Law § 241. Those claims run against the site owner and general contractor when a safety failure caused the injury. They proceed in court, on their own timeline, outside the comp system entirely.
The comp claim pays benefits. The Labor Law case can pay for the career. Keep both tracks in view before signing anything that could narrow either one.
