The city of San Diego holds the one district office that the state Division of Workers’ Compensation (DWC) lists for all of San Diego County, at 7575 Metropolitan Drive, Suite 202, and every ZIP code on the DWC’s list that begins with 919, 920 or 921 points to it.
Our office is in Newport Beach, in Orange County to the north.
7575 Metropolitan Drive
- San Diego district office
- 7575 Metropolitan Drive, Suite 202, San Diego, CA 92108-4424
- Main line 619-767-2083; Information and Assistance (I&A) unit 619-767-2082
Morning court sessions start at 8:30 a.m. and afternoon sessions at 1:30 p.m. For buses, the DWC points to the Metropolitan Transit System.
One office for the whole county
In October 2026 the DWC’s locator returned the San Diego office for 92101, 92108 and 92154, and the DWC’s ZIP list gives the same office to every 919, 920 and 921 ZIP code. That takes in Chula Vista, El Cajon, Escondido and Oceanside along with the city.
So for a San Diego worker, the venue question is not which office within the county. It is whether the case is filed in San Diego County or in another county the statute allows.
What venue choices does a San Diego worker have?
For a San Diego resident hurt in San Diego, the first two tests in Labor Code section 5501.5, residence on the filing date and place of injury, both lead to San Diego County. The third, available to a worker with a lawyer, is the county of the lawyer’s principal place of business; with our office in Newport Beach, that is Orange County. The employer may object to that third choice within 30 days of receiving the information request form that names it, and if it does, the Application for Adjudication of Claim, the form that opens a case before a workers’ comp judge, is filed under one of the first two.
Federal workers use a different system
The City of San Diego’s financial report for the year ended June 30, 2025 lists Naval Base San Diego as the city’s largest employer, a count that includes active-duty sailors and Marines along with civil service staff. Federal civilian employees file job-injury claims with the U.S. Department of Labor’s Federal Employees’ Compensation Program, not with the DWC, so the offices and rules on this page do not apply to them, and the firm, whose practice is California workers’ compensation, does not handle those federal claims.
The rest of the city’s ten largest are the University of California, San Diego, Sharp Health Care, the County of San Diego, Scripps Health, the City of San Diego, the San Diego Unified School District, Qualcomm, Kaiser Permanente and Rady Children’s Hospital.
How we handle San Diego cases
A San Diego case opens with the claim papers and the medical reports. If the firm takes it on, the county comes first, under the venue rules above; then come the deadlines, the qualified medical evaluator (QME) process and the appearances.
What we handle
| Benefit page | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Denied workers’ comp claim | A claim turned down, or one still waiting on a decision |
| UR and IMR denials | Treatment requests turned down in utilization review (UR) or independent medical review (IMR) |
| Temporary disability | Weekly wage-loss payments while recovering |
| Permanent disability | Payments once a lasting impairment is rated |
| QME evaluations | A qualified medical evaluator’s exam in a medical dispute |
| SJDB voucher and return to work | Retraining help after a permanent disability |
| Medical treatment and MPN doctors | Treatment through the employer’s medical provider network (MPN) |
