Your Unistat Date, or Unit Statistical Reporting Date, is a very important date that should be marked on every experience rated employers calendar. It’s the date that statistical information is reported by your workers compensation insurance company to your rating bureau, or advisory organization, for use on your next EMR or experience modification rate calculation.
Why’s it such an important date? While other factors reported will have an impact on your EMR calculation claims will more than likely make the greatest. At this point you need to be thinking about WORKERS COMPENSATION CLAIMS, CLAIM RESERVES, RESERVE ADJUSTMENTS, OPEN CLAIMS AND CLOSED CLAIMS. The unistat date is the cutoff date for any claim adjustments made on your account to show up on your next EMR.
Let’s say your Unistat Date is June 30th. You have a large claim and your current loss runs show a total of $100,000 in current payments and open reserves. The claim has been working its way through the system. Your injured employee is now fully recovered, the claim is closed on June 15th by your insurance company and your employee is back at work. The insurance company fails to correct their file in time and your claim record still shows an open reserve of $50,000 on June 30th which is reported to the rating bureau and included in your January 1st EMR. Or a more likely scenario may be where the claim has not yet closed but a final number has been developed and the claims adjuster could have made the reserve reduction but did not only to have the adjustment made shortly after your unistat date and the reserve remain on your next EMR calculation.
Get it? Timing is important. It’s the cut off date that counts!
How to determine your Unistat Date. You can calculate your Unistat Date by simply adding six months (180 days) to the renewal date of your experience rated policy. For example:
Policy Renewal Date Unistat Date
- January 1st June 30th
- February 1st July 30th
- March 15th August 14th
- May 20th October 19th
Now what? Now that you know how to determine your unistat date you have a tool you can use to begin monitoring your claim activity. Start by asking for your loss runs right after your workers compensation policy renews. That’s a great time to begin reviewing your open claims and claim activity. Contact your claim adjuster and become informed as to the progress of each open claim on your account.
As we all know by now claim activity is a primary driving force in the calculation of an employers EMR. Gaining a handle on claims will pay off in the long run and a good place to start is to know your Unistat Date. Remember, it’s the date claims information is reported to the rating bureau and used on your upcoming EMR calculation.
Need help with an out of control EMR? Be sure to contact an independent workers compensation consultant!
Hope this helps you out and thanks for reading!
