Workers Compensation Claims in Canberra
Making a claim after a work injury? Start with one question: who do you work for? That answer decides your deadlines, your certificate and what happens if you are knocked back. Tell us at the first call and we sort the rest.
Start Here
One Question, and Everything Else Follows
Four payers decide workers compensation claims in Canberra, across two statutes. Which one is yours turns on your employer, not on where you live or where the injury happened. Working that out takes about two minutes, and we do it with you on the first call.
See where you land: the which-scheme guideWhy this page starts with your employer
'Workers compensation in Canberra' has no single answer. A large share of the capital's workforce is covered by a Commonwealth statute rather than the territory's own, and the timeframes, the certificate rules, the payer and the dispute path all fork on who employs you. Anything below that is labelled for one scheme does not apply to the others. If you are unsure where you land, our which-scheme guide walks it through properly.
Three Things That Decide Everything Else
These are the questions that set the rules your claim runs on, and they all come before a form is filled in.
It Starts With Your Employer
A Commonwealth public servant and their private-sector neighbour two doors down are on different statutes, with different clocks, different certificate rules and different dispute paths. Nothing about a Canberra claim follows from your address. And there is no WorkCover ACT: WorkSafe ACT regulates the private-sector scheme and licenses its insurers, but it decides no claims.
The Deadlines That Cost You Money
The ACT private scheme runs on short, early deadlines, and missing one costs payments rather than just time. The Comcare scheme runs on determination windows instead, with a longer window for disease claims, which is where psychological claims sit. Both sets are set out further down this page, straight from the statutes.
What We Do, and What We Do Not
We are a medical clinic. We handle the medical side of a claim: assessment, diagnosis, certificates, treatment, and reports written to survive the scrutiny a scheme applies to them. We do not give legal advice and we do not run disputes. If you want legal advice, get it from a lawyer. We take no fee, commission or other benefit from whoever you choose, and we keep working on the clinical file either way.
The Clocks, Scheme by Scheme
Both schemes are built on timeframes, and every one of them assumes a doctor's certificate is already in place.
If you work for a Canberra private employer
48 hours
The employer must give its insurer notice of the injury within 48 hours of becoming aware of it (s 93(2))
On notice
Weekly payments must start when the worker gives the employer notice of the injury — before any claim or liability decision (s 38(1))
7 days
The claim must be lodged within 7 days of the injury to keep those automatic payments running (s 38(2))
28 days
The insurer must decide liability within 28 days — silence is deemed acceptance (s 128(2))
3 years
Outer limit to make a claim (s 120), with a just-and-reasonable court discretion for late claims
72 hours
The insurer's window to tell the worker in writing that the medical certificate is deficient. Miss it and the claim is taken to comply
If you work for the Commonwealth, the ACT Government or a national licensee
20 days
Statutory determination window for injury claims (calendar days, from 1 April 2024)
60 days
Statutory determination window for disease claims, the category psychological claims fall into
30 days
Window to request reconsideration of a determination; the reconsideration itself is then decided within 30 days
60 days
Window to apply to the Administrative Review Tribunal, which charges no application fee for workers compensation matters
$1,004.90 a week
The wage floor once the first 26 weeks are up
After 26 weeks, weekly compensation for total incapacity drops to 65% of average pre-incapacity weekly earnings, with the national minimum wage as a floor. That floor is $1,004.90 a week, or $26.44 an hour, from 1 July 2026.
Fair Work Ombudsman, National Minimum Wage from 1 July 2026; checked 20 August 2026
No application fee
What it costs to apply to the Administrative Review Tribunal
The Administrative Review Tribunal charges no application fee for a workers compensation review. It has flagged fee increases in other areas, so this is worth checking rather than assuming at the time you apply.
art.gov.au fee schedule; checked 20 August 2026
Every one of those clocks assumes a certificate is already in place, which is a doctor's document in both schemes. Our certificate page covers what goes in it, and our Canberra doctors book those appointments in person.
How a Canberra Claim Actually Runs
Five steps, with the fork marked at each one.
Work out your scheme
Commonwealth APS agencies and statutory authorities sit under the SRC Act, managed by Comcare. The ACT Government sits under the same SRC Act, self-insured, with claims run by EML. The ACT private sector sits under the territory's own 1951 Act, decided by one of five licensed insurers. National self-insured licensees such as Telstra, Australia Post, ANZ and Medibank sit under the SRC Act through their own claims managers. Serving ADF members are outside all of it, with military compensation running through the Department of Veterans' Affairs.
Tell your employer
In the ACT private scheme the employer has to give its insurer notice within 48 hours of becoming aware of the injury, and the insurer must act within 3 business days. Weekly compensation begins when you give that notice, before any claim form and before any liability decision, and it stops if no claim is made within 7 days, unless the injury itself prevented you claiming.
Get the certificate
From a doctor, in both schemes, at every stage. In the ACT private scheme it has to state whether your condition is consistent with your employment being a substantial contributing factor. In the Comcare scheme only a legally qualified medical practitioner can complete it, and what the scheme wants back is a diagnosis it can act on plus a clear picture of what you can and cannot do at work. This is the document the whole claim runs on.
Lodge, and watch the decision clock
In the ACT private scheme the insurer is taken to have accepted the claim if it has not rejected it inside the decision window, and it cannot reject inside that window merely because it has not had time to assess. The Comcare scheme has statutory determination windows instead, and no deemed acceptance at all.
If it is rejected
Here the schemes part company. In the Comcare scheme: reconsideration by an independent officer, then merits review at the Administrative Review Tribunal, then the Federal Court on a question of law. In the ACT private scheme there is no tribunal for claim disputes and no statutory internal review of an insurer's claim decision. Conciliation is voluntary and is not available where the issue is the rejection itself, so a rejected claim goes to arbitration in the ACT Magistrates Court, with appeal to the Supreme Court.
4 payers
Four payers decide Canberra workers compensation claims across two statutes. Who you work for picks yours.
Deemed accepted
Silence from an ACT private-scheme insurer past the decision window counts as acceptance. The Comcare scheme has no equivalent.
Where you work
Which scheme covers a border commuter is decided by the workplace, not the home address.
Working One Side, Living the Other
One boundary catches people on both sides of it. The ACT and New South Wales run mirror-image tests for which scheme a worker connects to, so the two fit together rather than overlap: the answer that puts you in one takes you out of the other. What settles it is where you usually work.
Federal employment sits above that test altogether. Where the employer is a Commonwealth agency or an SRC Act licensee, the Comcare scheme follows the worker, and an office on the New South Wales side of the border changes nothing about it. We see patients from either side, so none of this has to be resolved before you call.
Who Employs Canberra, District by District
Because the claim follows the employer, the mix of work in a district is the mix of schemes. Here is who works where.
Belconnen
Public service offices around the town centre (including the ABS headquarters), health and education campuses in Bruce, plus retail and trades across the district.
Gungahlin
APS commuters heading into Civic each morning, retail staff around the Marketplace, and the construction trades building out the district's newest suburbs.
Inner North
Civic office workers and public servants, ANU staff, and the hospitality and retail workforce along Braddon's Lonsdale Street and the Dickson precinct.
Inner South
Departmental headquarters in Barton and Parkes, hospitality across Kingston and Manuka, and trades and warehousing in Fyshwick.
Woden Valley
The main hospital campus's clinical and support workforce (ACT Government employees), Commonwealth office staff in Phillip, and retail across Westfield Woden.
Weston Creek
Local retail and services around Cooleman Court, school and clinic staff, and a large base of commuters into Woden and the Parliamentary Triangle.
Tuggeranong
Thousands of APS staff at the Caroline Chisholm Centre in Greenway, retail workers around South.Point, and trades servicing the valley's suburbs.
Molonglo Valley
The construction workforce building the district itself, alongside new residents who mostly commute to APS and office jobs in Civic, Woden and the Parliamentary Triangle.
Working in Canberra and living over the border, or the other way round? The test turns on where you usually work. Tell us both and we will place you. Call (02) 7238 7379 or book an appointment online.
Find the Suburb You Work In
Each Canberra suburb has its own page here. Choose the one you live or work in, and we take the claim from wherever it sits now.
Belconnen
Gungahlin
Inner North
Inner South
Tuggeranong
Molonglo Valley
Who pays depends on who you work for, and we sort that out on the first call. If you want to check it yourself first, our guide to which scheme covers you walks through it.
Claim Questions from Canberra Workers
Once You Know Your Scheme
Our Canberra services
- Workers compensation GPs in Canberrawhat goes in the certificate, and the clocks that run off it.
- Workers compensation physiotherapists in Canberratreatment you can start without a referral, with the funding handled behind it.
- Workers compensation orthopaedic specialists in Canberrasurgical opinions, second opinions and the reports a payer asks for.
- Workers compensation doctors in Canberracertificates in both schemes, and what a treating doctor actually carries.
- Workers compensation psychologists in Canberrapsychological injury treatment, in person in Canberra and by telehealth.
Canberra guides
- Workers compensation in Canberra and the ACTthe Canberra hub, covering both schemes end to end.
- Which workers compensation scheme am I under?Comcare, ACTPS or the ACT private scheme, sorted in one question.
- ACT Government (ACTPS) workers compensationthe federal statute, self-insured, with claims run by EML rather than WorkSafe ACT.
- Comcare workers compensationhow the federal scheme works, from certificate to tribunal.
- Comcare psychologistdoctor-arranged psychology billed direct to Comcare at scheme rates.
Not Sure Where to Start? Talk to Us
Our doctors sort out the scheme, the certificate and the deadlines at the first appointment, booked in person across Canberra.
Call (02) 7238 7379