Workers' Comp Claims for Los Angeles County Employees

You're hurt on the job for Los Angeles County. Where do you start?

Notify your supervisor or department HR without waiting, then put in a request for a DWC-1 claim form. Los Angeles County is a certified self-insured employer. The County itself, not an outside insurance company, stands behind your benefits.

California's Labor Code section 3700 requires every employer in the state to cover a work injury one of two lawful ways: carry an insurance policy, or earn state approval to pay claims out of its own funds. This page covers employees of the County of Los Angeles government itself. That is a separate employer from the City of Los Angeles, the State of California, or any other California county.

California's Office of Self-Insurance Plans keeps the public roster of employers approved to self-fund their own claims. Checked November 10, 2026, that roster lists the County of Los Angeles as an active self-insured public employer. The roster credits Sedgwick Claims Management Services, Inc. with handling those claims, through units based in the Pasadena, Orange, and Ontario areas.

The Chief Executive Office's Risk Management Branch publishes the same setup on its own public site. Its guidance walks an injured employee through several steps: get care, complete the DWC-1 form, submit it through your department, start treatment inside the medical provider network, and wait for Sedgwick to assign a claims examiner. The table below gives a quick contact point for each stage.

What's the process to report an injury and receive your DWC-1 form?

Loop in your supervisor or department HR the moment you're hurt, and mention that you need a claim form while you're at it. Written notice is allowed up to 30 days later, but quick reporting keeps your medical care moving.

The 30-day written-notice clock is set by Labor Code section 5400. A separate rule, section 5402, adds a backstop: if your department learns about the injury some other way, the law treats that discovery the same as formal notice. A qualifying injury, meaning one that keeps you out past your shift or needs more than basic first aid, triggers section 5401. That rule requires the form, generally known as the DWC-1, to reach you within a single working day, whether that happens face to face or through the mail. Fill out only the employee part, keep a copy, and turn the form in by hand or by certified mail. Your department then owes you a signed copy of its own completed part within a single working day.

Which company actually processes a Los Angeles County workers' comp claim?

Sedgwick Claims Management Services is the County's outside claims administrator. Once your department forwards your claim form, an examiner should be in touch within about four business days.

The State's self-insurance roster and the County's own Risk Management Branch both name Sedgwick as the outside administrator for county claims. It works through regional units in the Pasadena, Orange, and Ontario areas. A state rule, Title 8 section 10109, sets a duty for whoever looks into your claim: check fully into every benefit that might be due, not just build a defense. Lost track of your own claim number? Dial (213) 351-5479 and give your employee number instead. For what applies no matter which California employer sends your file to this same company, see our guide to dealing with Sedgwick.

Where do you get medical care, and who decides what treatment you receive?

A true emergency always comes first: go to the nearest provider, no matter its network. Outside of an emergency, an injured employee is directed into the medical provider network, managed through CorVel.

Whoever is handling your claim must arrange reasonable treatment for the injury, a duty Labor Code section 4600 sets. Care typically flows through the network itself, or through a physician you named in writing ahead of the injury. Emergency care goes to the nearest hospital or clinic no matter its network status; that provider should then arrange your transfer back for follow-up visits. Our medical provider network page, linked here, covers predesignation and switching doctors once you're inside a network.

Will you be paid during your recovery, and what if a payment lags or care gets denied?

Within 90 days, Sedgwick must accept or deny your claim entirely, and it has to keep paying for your treatment, up to $10,000, while it decides. Your first disability payment arrives well before that deadline.

Fourteen days: that is how long your department has, once it learns you are hurt and missing work, to send a first disability check, under Labor Code section 4650, which also tacks on a 10 percent bump by itself if that date slips. Section 5402 sets the other two clocks: 90 days to decide the claim, counted from your filing date, and up to $10,000 of required treatment while that decision stays open. Title 8 section 9812 is the regulation behind the paperwork: a letter must go out when your first payment does, and a separate letter, explaining why, if things run behind schedule. When your treating doctor's request gets denied or changed, the first stop is utilization review, under Labor Code section 4610. Still disagree afterward? You can ask for Independent Medical Review under section 4610.5, a look at your medical records by a doctor who has never touched your claim. A different rule, Labor Code section 5814, kicks in when a payment is delayed without good reason or refused outright: the extra penalty can reach $10,000, or 25 percent of what was owed, whichever figure is smaller. When the insurer turns down the entire claim, not just a treatment request, our guide to fighting a denied claim covers the appeal steps.

Can the County punish you for filing a claim, and where can you get free help?

No. Firing, threatening, or treating an employee unfairly for filing or mentioning a workers' comp claim breaks California law. Free help is also there if something about your claim feels wrong.

Labor Code section 132a protects you starting the moment you file a claim, or say that you plan to, and the same shield covers testifying in a coworker's case. Breaking that rule can cost an employer an extra 50 percent of your compensation, capped at $10,000, on top of reinstating you and repaying your lost wages. Separately, the County's Department of Human Resources runs a Return-to-Work Program, pairing an injured employee with a department Return-to-Work Coordinator once a doctor clears some duties. If something about a payment, a treatment denial, or your claim generally feels off, the DWC's free Information and Assistance Unit takes calls at (800) 736-7401. An Application for Adjudication of Claim is the formal filing that opens your case with the Workers' Compensation Appeals Board after an entire claim gets turned down. Bringing in a lawyer at that point usually costs 15 percent to 18 percent, calculated from the award, once a workers' compensation judge approves the fee under Labor Code section 4906. Our breakdown of typical workers' comp attorney fees in California walks through that approval step.

No affiliation connects Yazdchi Law P.C. to the County of Los Angeles, to Sedgwick Claims Management Services, Inc., or to CorVel Corporation.

California law, not any single adjuster's choice, sets the rules laid out above for a Los Angeles County work injury. The County's own pages simply supply the process details. It does not describe how Sedgwick or the County handled any one file. Each matter that comes in gets its own individual look, and not every one is taken on.

Perhaps a disability check was slow to arrive, a treatment request did not go through, or the claims examiner rejected the entire file. Call the firm at (661) 273-1780, or share what happened through the contact form. Tell us which department you work for, what your job involves, and how your claim is going so far.

Related reading for Los Angeles County employees

These guides go deeper on Sedgwick's role, the medical network, self-insurance generally, and what happens after a denial.

• What should you know about Sedgwick that applies no matter who you work for?
• What are the rules for naming or changing your treating doctor in a network?
• What options exist once an entire claim, and not just a single treatment, gets denied?
• What does it generally mean when a California employer self-insures?