Workplace Safety

In what situations might you succeed in defending your business against a Workers Compensation claim?

Although the answer depends on the state(s) in which you do business, some common threads in many states’ Workers Compensation laws permit employers to offer a number of “affirmative defenses” against suspicious claims:

Intoxication (from alcohol and/or drugs). You have the burden of establishing that intoxication was the prime or a contributing factor in the injury. This defense doesn’t apply if you permitted, encouraged, or knew about the alcohol or drug use.

Self-Inflicted Injury. You must prove that the injury was intentional.

Suicide. You might be required to prove the circumstances of the death.

Injury to an initial physical aggressor. As a rule, if the injured party started the fight, he or she can’t collect Comp benefits. To determine the facts, start an immediate investigation.

Horseplay or skylarking. In these cases, there’s no animosity between the employees involved, even though the activity causes bodily harm. Although you might be able to use horseplay as a defense, if you condoned this type of activity or didn’t punish it, you’d probably lose your case — and might also wind up paying for injuries to non-participating employees hurt as a result of horseplay.

Voluntary off-duty recreational or athletic activities. Your defense must meet the “reasonable expectations” test: how a reasonable person would interpret the situation.

A risk of assault inherent in the employment. If the employee suffers an injury on the job from a customer, visitor, or robber, the motive of the attacker is irrelevant.

Before you decide whether to defend yourself against a questionable Workers Comp claim, be sure to consult with your attorney.

Slips, trips, and falls (STFs) in the workplace are all too common – and a single accident can cost you thousands in medical payments and lost productivity.

To help businesses reduce STFs, Brian Roberts, Director of Workers Compensation and Ergonomics for CNA Insurance, has developed this six-point strategy, based on Japanese workplace practices:

1. Sort. Organize and straighten the workplace to make sure that aisles and walkways are free of trip and fall hazards.
2. Set in order. Analyze the efficiency of motion and workflow on the job (for example, review employee walking patterns and chart the results).
3. Shine. Eliminate all forms of contamination – such as dirt, fluids, or liquids – that could cause bone-breaking slips. This includes assessing floor surfaces for wear and pitting, and “transition points” (from concrete to tile, tile to carpet, carpet to marble, etc.) and eliminate or alter them. Make sure that you have the right floor cleaning products and that your maintenance staff understands how to use them properly, if they have limited English skills.
4. Standardize. Organize the workplace by prominent postings of such “visual management” tools as signs and warnings of potential STF hazards.
5. Keep lights clean. Dusty and dirty lights obscure lighting conditions, which increases the risk of STFs.
6. Sustain. Maintain the progress that you’ve achieved through the other strategies in order to make these improvements systemic and long-lasting.

Our agency’s safety management experts would be happy to recommend expert who can help you create – and maintain – an “STF-free workplace.” Feel free to get in touch with us at any time.

Safety programs based on changing employee behavior can help companies reduce the rate of accidents in the workplace – while slashing the frequency and severity of Workers Compensation Claims.

That’s the word from behavioral psychologist Daniel J. Moran, Senior Vice President of Quality Safety Edge (Joliet, IL), at a recent joint meeting of the Risk & Insurance Management Society Inc. and the American Society of Safety Engineers.

Moran noted that data from the Occupational Health and Safety Administration and Mercer L.L.C. show that businesses can save $3 to $6 in Workers Comp claim costs for every $1 they spend on behavior-based safety programs. He cited claims data from a major refinery, an energy firm, and a logging company that enjoyed significant reductions in lost-time Comp claims after they implemented behavior-based safety processes.

According to Moran, employees tend to engage in unsafe behaviors because improper shortcuts often have benefits, while accidents are rare. “If you’re not wearing your hard hat, you’re a lot more comfortable,” he said. “If you cut a few corners to make deadline, you… make that money.”

Moran advised companies to encourage safer behavior by rewarding workers who follow proper procedures. This includes pinpointing work procedures that help make them safer, measuring the use of safe workplace behaviors, giving positive feedback to workers who follow procedures, reinforcing good behaviors with individual and group rewards and social recognition, and conducting regular evaluations to see how safety can be improved.

Sounds like sound advice.

America is a tired country. About 20% of us average less than six hours of sleep a night, and the percentage of those who sleep eight hours or more keeps declining. The problem is worse for the ever-increasing number of employees who work nontraditional schedules. According to one nationwide study, 44% of shift workers are sleep deprived (compared with 29% of day workers).

Sleep deprivation in the workplace leads to poor concentration, absenteeism, accidents, errors, injuries – and fatalities.

In 2012 an American College of Occupational and Environmental Medicine task force developed these guidelines to help businesses manage the risks of workplace fatigue:

1. Staffing. Set shifts that minimize the need for employees to work additional hours.
2. Shiftwork. Reduce fatigue for night shift workers by setting schedules so that they can recover from sleep deprivation by sleeping at night and/or napping during the day.
3. Employee training and sleep disorder management. Teach workers about the impact, and health risks of sleep disorders. Screen them for symptoms through a questionnaire or physical. Employees should learn how to how to wake up at the same time every day, and avoid alcohol or caffeine before bedtime. Treatments for sleep disorders t include behavior modification, continuous positive airway pressure (C-PAP) equipment, and medication.
4. Workplace conditions. To increase employee alertness change such factors in the environment as light, temperature, humidity, noise, and ergonomic design. Provide breaks for food, exercise, conversation and – if possible – naps.
5. Individual risk assessment. Give managers authority to encourage rest breaks, shift dangerous activities to others, or use a buddy approach to improve alertness. Make sure that workers can identify such signs of excessive fatigue as yawning, a drooping head or eyelids, or lapses in attention.

To learn more about how you can help your workers fight fatigue in the workplace, just let us know at any time. We’re here to serve you.

Most states allow company owners and executives to opt out of (or not opt in to) Workers Compensation insurance. But did you know that if you choose this option your Health insurance policy might well not pick up work-related medical claims?

If you carry Health coverage through your company Group plan, you can usually arrange to be covered for work-related injuries under this policy – which then becomes “24-hour” coverage for you. However, many small business owners and managers are insured under the Health Plan of their spouse or parents – which almost always exclude work-related injuries.

Let’s say that you exempt yourself from Workers Compensation and have coverage under your spouse’s Health insurance – and you suffer a serious injury in a work-related, at-fault auto accident. Once you have exhausted the Medical Payments coverage under the company’s Commercial Auto policy, the chances are that you’ll have to pick up the tab for the rest of your medical bills. You might even have to choose between limiting your treatment options or going bankrupt (unpaid medical bills are the nation’s leading cause of bankruptcy).

Even if you have “24-hour” insurance under your own Health policy, this coverage will not reimburse you for income lost during your convalescence.

So, what’s the solution? You might consider buying a Disability income policy – or decide to cover yourself under Workers Compensation, after all.

As always, our agency stands ready to offer our professional advice. Just give us a call.

Nearly one of four people aged 64 to 75 are still at work – and the number is skyrocketing, with more Baby Boomers who reach retirement age staying in the workplace. The good news: Older workers have a lower injury rate. The bad news: Their injuries tend to be more serious and require more time away from work.

Senior workers have specific safety issues. Their retention is often shorter, they’re more easily distracted, have slower reaction time, declining vision and hearing, and a poorer sense of balance. These physical limitations lead to specific types of injuries for older workers, ranging from falls to accumulated injuries after years of doing the same task What’s more, they sometimes deny their deteriorating abilities, which can lead to them to trying to work past their new limits.

Indicators that older workers might need accommodations can be physical (fatigue or tripping), psychological/emotional (loss of patience or irritability), numbers and patterns of sick days, or more frequent minor injuries or near misses.

You can help protect your senior workers by:

• finding ways for them to work smarter, not harder
• decreasing activities that require exertion, such as working in heat or cold or climbing ladders
• adjusting work areas with better lighting, reduced noise, fewer obstacles, and less need to bend or stoop
• redefining standards of productivity
• learning the limitations of older workers, perhaps by conducting annual hearing or vision tests

Make sure that safety culture becomes an institutional value for all employees. For example, when on-the-job feedback indicates that an older worker is having trouble, don’t fire the person. This will discourage honest input from employees who might feel responsible for their co-worker’s loss of employment.

For more information on making your workplace safer for older employees, feel free to get in touch with us.

A revision to the formula for calculating Workers Compensation rates is saving premium dollars for companies in a large number of states since the first of this year.

The change involves the experience modification (“mod”), the premium credit or debit that businesses receive for their claims experience. The mod compares your claim experience to that of other firms in your industry; if your experience is good, you’ll get a premium credit if not, you’ll receive a debit.

What has changed is the “split point” between the primary and excess portions of a claim. This value is important because the primary portion of each claim has a far larger impact on predicting an employer’s mod than does the excess portion. For the past two decades, the split point has been $5,000. However, inflation has both eroded the primary/excess split point and hurt its predictive power; the mod doesn’t give enough credit to good experience and doesn’t penalize poor experience enough. The change raises the split point to $10,000 in 2013, $13,500 in 2014, and an estimated $17,000 in 2015.

In 26 of the 38 states that have approved the new formula, a survey of more than 75,000 businesses by the National Council on Compensation Insurance found that 62% of them will see their rates fall by 5% or less this year. Another 11% will enjoy decreases of 5% to 10%, while rates will stay unchanged for 4.5%. Fewer than one in four (22.5%) – mostly larger businesses – would see a rate increase.

Our Workers Comp specialists would be happy to discuss the revised experience mod formula with you – and make sure that you enjoy the cost savings that it can provide. Feel free to get in touch with us at any time.

Misuse of powerful prescription painkillers, whether intentional or accidental, is a rapidly growing threat to employers throughout the nation.

Opioid overdoses caused more than 16,000 deaths in 2010, the latest year for which data is available; and about 12 million people use prescription painkillers for nonmedical reasons. In addition to the human tragedy, opioid addiction creates a significant financial problem for both businesses – in terms of lost productivity – and their insurance companies. Nonmedical use of prescription painkillers costs Health insurers more than $70 billion a year; while narcotics prescriptions account for one-fourth of Workers Comp prescription drug expenses (costs that ultimately come out of employers’ pockets).

Government plays a significant role in dealing with this problem. The federal Department of Health and Human Services regulates Opioid Treatment Programs (OTPs) through the Division of Pharmacologic Therapies. On the state level, for example, California has followed the lead of Washington State by devising treatment guidelines to curb over-prescription and abuse of opioids. These measures include limiting opioid prescriptions to six weeks after surgery or injury and using non-opioid painkillers as a preliminary pain management measure in non-acute cases.

However, these regulatory or legislative efforts can only go so far. No employer can afford to ignore the issue of opioid abuse among its workers – and your Workers Compensation manager is well-positioned to intervene in these cases by implementing a risk management plan that:

• ensures that patients are treated early and effectively;
• monitors and manages opioid prescriptions;
• uses predictive modeling to tag potentially severe claims;
• requires physician peer reviews for opioid prescriptions;
• uses drug testing and screening workers prescribed with drugs;
• provides post-addiction help; and
• phases workers back into their jobs

We stand ready to offer our advice at any time.

Confined spaces (such as storage tanks, ship compartments, pits, silos, wells, sewers, boilers, tunnels and pipelines) can be dangerous places. According to OSHA, accidents in confined areas kill an average of 70 American workers a year and injure hundreds, primarily due to atmospheres that were flammable, toxic, or corrosive.

To make sure that your employees know what they should do – and, just as important, not do – in case they need to deal with confined space emergency – safety experts recommend that they follow these guidelines.

What workers should do:

First, report the situation immediately to your supervisor, who will notify an emergency rescue team. If the people inside can rescue themselves safely, keep in contact with them throughout the procedure, and help them in any way possible without entering the space. If a rescue by an outside party is needed – and you’re trained, equipped, and authorized to do this – go ahead. If the emergency calls for a rescue team, let those inside the space know that help is on the way, keep in touch with them, and wait for the team to arrive.

What workers should not do:

Never let other workers attempt a rescue unless they have the training, equipment, and authorization to do so. Don’t allow anyone except the designated rescue team to enter a confined space in an emergency. Don’t leave the entry point to the confined space until the rescue team arrives.

We’d be happy to work with you on training your workers to deal with a confined space emergency – just give us a call.

You can’t eliminate the stress that your employees bring to work – but you can offer them these guidelines to help manage workplace stressors on their own:

1 – Prioritize, streamline, delegate, and discard. When facing a task, ask if it’s really necessary to do immediately.
2 – Break things up. Take two – to three – minute breaks every hour and commit to doing at least one fun thing every day.
3 – Make time. Build time into your schedule for creative expression, healthy eating, moderate daily exercise, hanging out with friends, and enjoying nature.
4 – Be on time. Build in cushion time between appointments to allow for traffic and the unexpected.
5 – Send negativity flying. If a co-worker is on the warpath, visualize an airplane with an ad banner over the person’s head, with each negative word floating up into the banner and out of view.
6 – Relax and watch what happens. Do mini-meditations or mindful breathing while you’re between tasks or in line at the cafeteria.
7 – Get essential nutrients. Go beyond vitamins and begin to think about daylight and laughter as integral parts of your daily life.
8 – Consider what you’re consuming. Sugar, caffeine, and alcohol can increase stress levels.
9 – Watch your words. Don’t let negative internal chatter and self-recrimination distract and demoralize you.
10 – Be kind. Do something nice for a different co-worker every day until it becomes second nature to reduce stress for others.
11 – Sleep on it. Sleep deprivation a major culprit in stress is Try to get restful, restorative slumber every night, and watch your stress level decline.