Here are some of the ways we will work with you to control your costs: 

Controlling Workers Compensation Costs

The most important element of any workers compensation program is management control. It can be evidenced by accident prevention, claims control, litigation control and careful monitoring of the insurers.

1. Preventing accidents. Loss prevention has three components:

a. Design. A safety specialist should design a management policy statement, safe job procedures, pre-employment screening, safety committees, recordkeeping, self-inspection procedures, training, incentive programs and other elements of an ongoing program. Most important is communicating to the workers management’s commitment to the program.

b. Inspections. Regular physical inspections should detect hazards and check compliance with standards and procedures.

c. Loss analysis. Loss records should be analyzed to detect unsafe conditions, accident-prone individuals and locations of accidents.

 2. Managing claims. The way a claim is handled can greatly influence: (1) how soon the injured employee returns to work, and (2) whether or not an attorney is retained. Components of effective claims management are:

a. Immediate contact. The adjustor and, to the extent feasible, coworkers, contact the injured person to assure all needs will be taken care of and that the company is concerned. Contact should be continued regularly through claim resolution.

b. Return-to-work coordination. Alternative work should be offered within restricted work capacity, if it will help return the employee sooner.

c. Telephonic or field nurse case management. These services can assist the employer to obtain treatment plans, which are directed toward resolving the injury.

d. Vocational rehabilitation. Rehabilitation services can reduce loss of earnings benefits for injured workers who are unable to return to the pre-injury occupation. These services can be useful to enhance the injured worker’s transferable skills to meet qualifications for alternative work.

e. Monthly reports. Keeping senior management informed on the status of all open claims can be useful.

3. Managing litigation. The most important part of litigation control is to prevent it through attentive claims management.

4. Monitoring the insurer. Workers compensation insurers make many mistakes in clerical work and should be constantly monitored. Highly significant savings can result from having a well-trained person (risk manager, consultant or broker) continually check:

• Worker classifications. Try to understand jobs done by different workers to see that they are correctly classified.
• Payroll. See that overtime, or "premium," pay is not included and that executive payroll is included for the right amount.
• Experience modification. Check figures going into the Xmod and check the calculations. Mistakes are frequent. The most common are incorrect payrolls, loss amounts and injury coding.
• Reserves. Follow large reserves closely to see that they are adjusted when needed and that closed claims are removed from the list.
• Subrogation. See that the insurer follows all possible subrogation potentials. This is especially important with product injuries, vehicles, and when the employee is working on premises of others.