Latest Workers' Compensation Headlines

All the headlines from our Workers' Compensation Topic Page, ordered by recency.

South Central Regulation Report Card: Texas’ Grade Rises, Arkansas’ Drops

Dec 22 2016 // No South Central state had the best score and none had the worst in a report recently released by a conservative-leaning research organization that annually assesses the effectiveness states’ insurance regulatory...

Midwest Regulation Report Card: States’ Grades Range from A to D

Dec 22 2016 // Grades assigned to the insurance regulatory systems in the Midwest states of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin range from A to D in a...

West Regulation Report Card: California Most Politicized State

Dec 22 2016 // A report gives California’s insurance regulatory environment low marks for auto body repair rules, the insurance commissioner’s call for insurers to divest from coal, its prior approval law and being the...

Ohio Court: No Permanent Partial and Total Disability Benefits for Same Claim

Dec 20 2016 // The Ohio Supreme Court has ruled that an injured worker may not receive permanent partial disability compensation when that worker is receiving permanent total disability payments for the same claim. The Dec. 8 ruling came...

Percentage of Non-Subscribers in Texas Workers’ Comp System Falls

Dec 19 2016 // The percentage of companies that don’t participate in the Texas workers’ compensation system has fallen to the lowest level since 1993, the agency that regulates this line of insurance in the state has...

Illinois Large Workers’ Comp Deductible Rules Approved

Dec 19 2016 // The Illinois Department of Insurance has posted in the Illinois Register a second notice of the approval by the Illinois Joint Committee on Administrative Rules (IJCAR) of rules concerning size limits on large deductibles...

Study: Cumulative Trauma Claims in California Comp Affected by Attorneys

Dec 19 2016 // A new study on California’s workers’ compensation system finds a “strong association” between attorney involvement and the high cost of cumulative trauma claims. The California Workers’...

Court Rules Florida Workers’ Comp Rate Hike to Remain, For Now

Dec 19 2016 // Florida’s workers’ compensation rate increase of 14.5 percent will remain in effect while a Florida appeals court reviews a legal challenge to the state’s recent ratemaking process. The First District...

Brentwood Services Administrators Promotes Saldana in Tennessee

Dec 19 2016 // Brentwood Services Administrators Inc. (BSA), headquartered in Brentwood, Tenn., has promoted Nick Saldana to the position of claim representative II in its Tennessee Claims Department, according to Jeff Pettus, president...

Washington Workers’ Comp Rates for 2017 to Increase Less Than 1%

Dec 19 2016 // The average premium for workers’ compensation coverage in Washington will go up less than 1 percent in 2017, according to the Department of Labor & Industries. L&I announced this month the rate will rise by...

California Workers’ Comp Division Files Medical Fee Schedule Amendment

Dec 16 2016 // California’s Division of Workers’ Compensation has adopted and filed an amendment to the official medical fee schedule hospital outpatient departments and ambulatory surgical centers section with the Secretary...

OSHA Investigating Kansas Oil-Drilling Blast That Injured 5

Dec 16 2016 // Federal workplace safety officials are investigating a western Kansas oil field explosion that injured five workers, two of them critically. The U.S. Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health...

Texas Mutual Offers Guidance on New OSHA Rules

Dec 16 2016 // Recognizing the complex nature of keeping up with rules promulgated by the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), workers’ compensation insurer, Texas Mutual, has provided guidance on one of...

Mississippi Supreme Court Weighing Injured Contract Workers’ Right to Sue

Dec 16 2016 // A worker is fighting one of Mississippi’s largest industries in a skirmish over who can be sued when employees suffer on-the-job injuries. The Mississippi Supreme Court Tuesday heard arguments in a suit by Quindon...

Origami Acquires Utah-based Workers’ Comp Form Provider Claimwire

Dec 15 2016 // Origami Risk has acquired Kaysville, Utah-based Claimwire, a provider of automated workers’ compensation forms, compliance resources and regulatory information to the insurance industry. Terms of the deal were not...

California’s Workers’ Comp Division Posts Adjustments to Medical Fee Schedule

Dec 15 2016 // California’s Division of Workers’ Compensation has posted an order adjusting the Durable Medical Equipment, Prosthetics, Orthotics and Supplies (DMEPOS) section of the official medical fee schedule to conform...

Maine-Based MEMIC’s Founding President and CEO to Retire in 2017

Dec 15 2016 // The MEMIC Group, the Portland, Maine, headquartered workers’ compensation insurer, has announced the retirement of its founding President and CEO, John T. Leonard, effective September of 2017. Leonard serves as the...

Atlas General Insurance Services Expands Workers’ Compensation Footprint in Southeast

Dec 15 2016 // San Diego, CA, December 15, 2016 – Atlas General Insurance Services, LLC (‘Atlas’), a national multi-line program administrator, announced the addition of four more states eligible for workers’...

California Workers’ Comp Medical Mileage Rate Will Decline for 2017

Dec 13 2016 // The Internal Revenue Service has announced that the standard mileage rate for business miles will decline 0.5 cents per mile to 53.5 cents per mile as of Jan. 1, 2017. The California Workers’ Compensation Institute...

California Workers’ Comp Bureau Issues Report on 3Q Insurer Experience

Dec 13 2016 // California’s Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau on Tuesday issued its report on statewide workers’ comp insurer loss and premium experience through Sept 30, which among other things shows that...