L&I Travel Reimbursement and Vocational Rehab: Two Benefits Washington Workers Often Miss

If you’ve been driving yourself to physical therapy, doctor visits, or a retraining class since your workplace injury, you might be paying for gas, parking, and tolls you don’t actually have to cover. Washington’s Department of Labor & Industries (L&I) travel reimbursement for travel tied to their claim, and it also offers vocational rehabilitation to workers who can’t go back to the job they had before. Both benefits are real, but L&I doesn’t advertise them well, and workers often find out about them only after they’ve already paid out of pocket.

This guide covers who qualifies for travel reimbursement, how to file for it, what vocational rehabilitation actually includes, and the mistakes that cost workers these benefits.

Does L&I Pay for Mileage to Medical Appointments?

Yes, in specific situations. L&I reimburses travel expenses tied to your claim when:

• You have to travel more than 15 miles one way to get health care for your claim, and your claim manager pre-approves the trip.
• The travel is part of an approved vocational retraining plan.
• L&I sends you to an Independent Medical Examination (IME). This uses a separate form, described below.

Covered costs can include mileage, parking, and tolls, and in some cases food or lodging for longer trips. You’ll need to keep receipts for everything except parking under $10, which doesn’t require one.

How to File a Travel Reimbursement Request

Once you have pre-authorization for a trip beyond your first visit, filing is straightforward:

1. Get pre-authorization from your claim manager before you travel, for any visit after your first one.
2. Keep every receipt for tolls, parking over $10, and any other expense. Mileage itself doesn’t require a receipt.
3. Have the provider or their office staff sign the form to confirm your appointment date.
4. Submit Form F245-145-000, Travel Reimbursement Request, by mail to L&I within one year of the trip, listing the date, destination, and reason for each trip.

Traveling to an IME works a little differently — use Form F245-224-000 instead, and follow the same one-year filing window.

What Is Vocational Rehabilitation, and Who Qualifies?

If your injury makes it hard to return to the job you had when you got hurt, your claim manager may assign a vocational counselor to look at your options. The counselor typically asks three questions first: can your regular job be temporarily modified, can it be permanently modified, or is a different job available with the same employer.

If none of those work, the counselor performs an employability assessment, matching your experience, education, skills, and physical restrictions against the job market in your area. From there, L&I decides whether you’re already employable, eligible for further vocational services, or unable to work at all. Vocational benefits are discretionary, not automatic; they have to be triggered by this process, not requested outright.

What a Vocational Plan Covers

If you qualify for further services, you and a vocational counselor build a training plan around a specific job goal based on your skills, interests, and medical restrictions. The plan can include schooling or on-the-job training and can’t run longer than two years. While you’re actively participating, you keep receiving time-loss compensation; if you stop participating without a good reason, L&I can suspend both your medical and time-loss benefits.

Once a plan is approved, you generally have two paths: work through it with your assigned vocational counselor, or pursue an independent option that gives you more control over the training itself. Either way, the goal is the same — get you back to sustainable, gainful work.

Common Mistakes That Cost Workers These Benefits

• Paying for gas and parking without asking the claim manager for pre-authorization first, then finding out the trip needed approval before it happened, not after.
• Skipping the provider’s signature on the travel form, which can get a reimbursement request sent back.
• Missing the one-year filing deadline for a trip.
• Assuming vocational rehab isn’t available because no one brought it up. It has to be triggered by an assessment, and workers sometimes have to push for that assessment to happen.
• Letting a denied vocational benefit decision go unchallenged. You have only 15 days to file a written protest with L&I’s Vocational Dispute Resolution Office.

Frequently Asked Quesitons

How much does L&I pay per mile? L&I reimburses mileage at the department’s current travel rate, which changes periodically. Your claim manager can confirm the current rate when you request pre-authorization.

Can I still get reimbursed for a trip I already paid for? Yes, as long as you file within one year of the trip and had the required pre-authorization for any travel beyond your first visit.

Get Help With the Benefits You’re Owed

Travel reimbursement and vocational rehabilitation are two of the most overlooked parts of an L&I claim, and both can add up to real money and real support over the life of a claim. If L&I denied your vocational benefits, missed a travel reimbursement, or you’re just not sure what you qualify for, Emery | Reddy can review your claim and explain your options. Contact us today for a free case review. There is no fee unless we recover for you.