How Does a WSIB Claim Work in Ontario?

You are hurt, you are being handed forms, and nobody has told you which clock is running.

Report the injury to your employer immediately. Your employer then has three business days to file a Form 7 with the WSIB. Two objection deadlines govern the rest of the claim. You have 30 days to object to a decision about return to work, work transition, labour market re-entry or re-employment. You have 6 months to object to everything else, including initial entitlement, loss of earnings, health care and permanent impairment. Section 120 of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act sets both limits.

An objection is the formal step that begins an appeal. It is not a complaint and it is not a telephone call. It is written notice filed inside the limit that applies to the decision you are challenging. Miss the limit and the decision usually stands, however wrong it was.

1. How soon must you report a workplace injury in Ontario?

The same day where you can manage it. Early reporting gets medical care started, gets the file opened and keeps the account of what happened accurate while everyone still remembers it.

Once your employer knows, they have three business days to file a Form 7. You file your own account separately on a Form 6, the Worker's Report of Injury or Disease. Those two documents are read side by side, so a gap between them is worth avoiding. If your employer has not filed, you are still able to report the injury to the WSIB yourself.

Delay is the most common way a straightforward claim becomes a contested one. The Ontario workplace injury guide covers the wider picture.

2. When should you see a doctor after a workplace injury?

Straight away, and tell the provider plainly that the injury happened at work. That single sentence is what routes your care through the WSIB rather than through your provincial health plan, and it puts the work connection in the clinical record from the first visit.

You are entitled to see a health professional of your own choosing. Your provider documents the injury, the treatment plan and any limits on what you can safely do. Those limits become the basis of every return to work conversation that follows, so it matters that they describe your actual day rather than your best hour.

3. What is a WSIB claim number for?

Once the claim is registered you receive a claim number. Every appointment, every letter, every telephone call and every receipt attaches to it.

Write it somewhere you will find it in a hurry. Clinics ask for it before they ask for your name, and an appointment booked without it can end up billed to the wrong place.

4. Which appointments will a WSIB claim involve?

More than most people expect, and they come from different directions. Your family doctor. Specialists on referral. Physiotherapy or other rehabilitation. Assessments arranged by the WSIB rather than by you, which may include a medical assessment or a functional abilities evaluation.

The assessments arranged by the board are different in kind from your own treatment. The clinician is examining you in order to write a report for someone else. Knowing that in advance is not cynicism, it is preparation.

5. How does WSIB return to work planning work?

The WSIB works with you and your employer to plan a safe return, which may involve modified duties, reduced hours or a graduated schedule built around your medical limits.

Read any plan against what you can actually do rather than what you hope to manage. A plan you cannot sustain tends to end in a second injury or a report that you declined suitable work. If a task is beyond you, say so at the time and in writing, not after you have tried it and failed.

6. What are the deadlines to object to a WSIB decision?

This is the section to reread. Both limits come from section 120 of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act.

30 days to object to a decision about return to work, work transition, labour market re-entry or re-employment.

6 months to object to everything else, which covers initial entitlement, loss of earnings, health care and permanent impairment.

Two useful details sit behind those numbers. Where a single letter carries two decisions with different limits, the six month limit applies to both. Separately, you have 21 days to object to your medical information being released to your employer. The Ontario WSIB claim deadlines page holds the full list.

7. What happens if your WSIB claim is denied?

A denial is a decision, which means it is a thing you object to rather than a thing you accept. The letter should tell you what was decided, why and how to object. If any of those three is unclear, ask for it in writing.

Objecting starts with written notice inside the limit. What makes the difference at that stage is rarely eloquence. It is whether there is a record showing what you reported, when you reported it, what your treating providers observed and what you were and were not able to do week by week.

What are you allowed to do during a WSIB claim?

More than most injured workers believe.

You are allowed to choose your own health professional rather than one selected by your employer.

You are allowed to object to your medical information being released to your employer, within 21 days.

You are allowed to say that a task in a return to work plan is beyond you, at the time you are asked to do it.

You are allowed to report a new symptom or a worsening one at any point in the claim.

You are allowed to ask for any decision in writing and to ask which provision it rests on.

You are allowed to bring someone with you to an appointment or a meeting and to take notes while you are there.

What should you record during a WSIB claim?

Seven things. Keep all seven in one place from the first day, because the objection you may need to file in six months is built from what you wrote in the first week.

1. The injury itself. Date, time, location, what you were doing, what happened, who saw it and who you told first.
2. The forms. The date you filed your Form 6, the date your employer filed the Form 7 and your claim number once it arrives.
3. Symptoms, daily. What hurts, where, how badly on a scale you use consistently, how you slept and what you could not manage that day.
4. Appointments. Date, provider, what was discussed, what was recommended, referrals made and any limits the provider set on your activity.
5. Contact with the WSIB and your employer. Date, the name of the person, what was said, what was agreed and what was refused. They log every call. Log yours.
6. Return to work offers and what actually happened. The duties offered, the hours, what you attempted and how you felt during and after. This is the record that decides whether a plan was suitable.
7. Money. Days missed, hours reduced, prescriptions, equipment, travel and parking to appointments.

The National Workplace Injury Recovery Guide holds all seven and works with any board in Canada. The Ontario Workplace Injury Companion Guide holds the Ontario part, meaning the forms, the objection limits and the appeal route. Most workers need both, because a detailed record filed after a deadline still fails.

Recovery takes time. A clear record makes the process survivable.

Your Recovery. Documented. Protected.

Read next

• Common Mistakes Injured Workers Make During a WSIB Claim
• What Happens at a WSIB Medical Assessment
• Ontario WSIB Claim Deadlines

Last verified August 2026. Objection limits cited are set by section 120 of the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act and apply in Ontario only. Other provinces and territories set their own limits through their own boards. Hurt Square Companion Guides are tools for documenting your own recovery. They are not legal, medical or insurance advice.