At our firm, Workers Compensation Consultants, we receive emails and calls everyday from a variety of sources. We hear from employers, attorneys, insurance agents, auditors, insurance company personnel, contractors, manufacturers, non-profit organizations just to mention a few all with one thing in common, some kind of workers compensation problem. Makes sense. It’s the kind of work we do! But when should you contact a Workers Comp Consultant for help with your problem? Let’s talk…
Workers compensation insurance is not like other insurance products. It’s a heavily regulated product governed by individual state statute with rules developed and enforced by a combination of state agencies and contracted rating bureaus. The need for oversight stems from the mandate of this product to provide benefits for workers injured on the job. The trade-off for an employer to participate by securing coverage is protection from civil remedies by injured workers. And in most states it’s required by statute that an employer participate. So with workers compensation insurance we have a product that’s governed by the state through a set of complicated rules. Rules, and interpretation of those rules, make the workers compensation industry move like a less than well oiled machine.
At our firm we spend most of our time working on premium generation related issues for our clients. There are several firms out there, like ours, who do a great job of assisting those experiencing these type of problems.
Here’s some of the more persistant issues that cause our clients to contact us for help:
- Re-classification of employees at audit time;
- Re-assignment of employee payroll at audit;
- Misclassification of employees on the policy;
- Incorrect application of policy credits;
- Improper class codes;
- Bureau site inspections;
- Incorrect interpretation of class code definitions;
- Incorrect premium audit;
- Poor claim handling by the insurance carrier;
- Incorrect or mistakes on experience modification rate calculations;
- Out of control EMR or experience modification rates;
- Employers with retrospective rating or loss sensitive rating plans;
You’ll find that there are associated problems with just about every individual premium producing part of a workers compensation policy. (You can find detailed information on each of these topics at our website.)
So, when should you ask a workers compensation consultant for help with your problem? Take a look at the list above. If you’ve experienced any of these issues then maybe, just maybe you should call!
Hope this helps you out and thanks for reading!
