First: the accident has to be declared
This is the step that decides everything else.
The employer is required to declare a workplace accident through the established procedure. If they do not, or present it as a domestic injury, you are left with medical records but without a recognised workplace accident, and your rights follow from that recognition.
If your employer is persuading you not to declare it because “it will cause problems”, that is the moment to call. Not months later.
What to do straight away
Get medical attention and insist that the records state where and how it happened. The wording in that first medical document carries weight later.
Write down the names of witnesses. Photograph the location and anything connected to the cause: missing guards, faulty equipment, protective gear that was not provided.
Keep everything in writing: safety briefings, rotas, orders, messages.
What can be claimed
Social insurance benefits are one thing. Separately, where the employer is liable, compensation can be claimed for the loss those benefits do not cover, including pain and suffering.
Many people stop after the first and never learn about the second.
“It was my own carelessness”
I hear this often and it is rarely the whole truth.
The other side gets examined too: whether there was a safety briefing and whether it was real, whether protective equipment was provided, whether the equipment was sound, whether there was overwork or work without breaks.
Even where you contributed, responsibility is rarely entirely yours.
If you worked without a contract
That does not mean you have no rights. It means the employment relationship is proved first, and it can be proved by other means. See unpaid wages.
If you are a foreign national who worked in Bulgaria
Your rights are the same. Correspondence and proceedings can run through a power of attorney if you have gone home.
What I will need
The medical records from day one. The accident declaration, or the refusal to file one. The employment contract, job description and safety briefings. Photographs and witness names. Everything received from the insurance institute.
This page provides general information and does not constitute legal advice on any specific case. Rights and deadlines depend on the facts and the applicable law.