Massachusetts updates workers' comp benefit rates every October, but the bigger issue is this: your boss does not get to make you use your own health or auto insurance instead of workers' compensation if you were hurt doing your job.

What should have happened: you should have reported the crash to your employer right away, gotten medical care, and the employer should have sent the claim to its workers' comp insurer. If you missed work for 5 or more full or partial calendar days, the employer is supposed to file an injury report with the insurer and the Massachusetts Department of Industrial Accidents (DIA).

If this was also a vehicle crash in Cambridge, there may have been a separate auto claim too. Massachusetts has PIP coverage, but that does not erase a workers' comp claim when the crash happened on the job.

What to do now: if months have passed, you may still have time. A Massachusetts workers' comp claim is generally subject to a 4-year deadline from when you knew the injury was connected to work. A lawsuit for a vehicle injury is usually subject to a 3-year statute of limitations. End-of-year pressure from insurers to settle fast does not change those deadlines.

Do this now:

• Get the Cambridge Police crash report if there was one.
• Gather pay stubs, ER records, physical therapy notes, and any texts where your boss told you to use your own insurance.
• Check whether the employer's workers' comp insurer ever opened a claim.
• If not, file through the DIA before the deadline gets close.

What comes next: the insurer may argue you waited too long, that your pain is from an old injury, or that workers' comp is your only remedy. Sometimes that is wrong. You may still have a workers' comp case, and if another driver, contractor, or company vehicle caused the crash, you may also have a separate third-party claim. That matters because workers' comp does not pay pain and suffering, but a third-party injury claim can.