Latest Workers' Compensation Headlines

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

Vermont Workers’ Compensation Rates to Fall Again

Jan 25 2023 // Vermont businesses will see another rate decrease in workers’ compensation insurance in 2023. This will mark the seventh consecutive year of rate reductions.The loss cost decrease of an average 6.7%, which takes...

OSHA Says Amazon.com Exposed Workers to Safety Hazards

Jan 20 2023 // A U.S. government agency on Wednesday issued citations against Amazon.com Inc. for failing to keep warehouse workers safe, by exposing them to ergonomic hazards that resulted in serious injuries.The Department of...

Mayton Named to Arkansas Workers’ Comp Commission

Jan 18 2023 // Arkansas Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders announced that she will appoint Michael Mayton to the Arkansas Workers’ Compensation Commission (AWCC).Mayton works as a lawyer in private practice specializing in the defense...

Massachusetts to Weigh Proposed 4% Cut in Workers’ Compensation Rates

Jan 17 2023 // The Massachusetts insurance department will hear testimony virtually on February 3 regarding a proposed 4.0% decrease in average workers’ compensation rates.The rate filing submitted by the Workers’...

Doctors, Insurers Clash on Florida Workers’ Comp Physician Dispensing Rules

Jan 17 2023 // Physician dispensing of medications has long been a flash point in workers’ compensation insurance, with at least 22 states regulating or restricting the practice. Florida is no exception to the controversy, and...

OSHA Fines Utility Eversource $333K for Fatal Beacon Hill Arc Flash, Blast in Boston

Jan 13 2023 // The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration has cited Eversource Energy Service Co. for five violations of workplace safety standards after its investigation of a fatal arc flash and arc blast in...

Florida Workers’ Comp Division Busy with Panel Review, Hearings, Rule Changes

Jan 5 2023 // The Florida Office of Insurance Regulation’s Division of Workers’ Compensation is having a busy January.Starting today, Jan. 5, the Division of Workers’ Compensation will hold meetings on key medical...

California Workers’ Comp Study Tracks Inpatient Care Utilization Trends

Jan 5 2023 // A new study shows that after across-the-board declines in California inpatient hospitalizations during the COVID-19 crisis of 2020, the number of inpatient stays paid under Medicare, Medi-Cal, and private coverage began to...

OSHA Penalties Upheld Against Vermont Cable Firm Over Death at New York Site

Dec 29 2022 // An administrative law judge has affirmed Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) citations and $24,290 in penalties issued to Eustis Cable Enterprises Ltd., a Brookfield, Vermont, telecommunications...

Buffalo Bus Driver Gets 5 Years Probation for Workers’ Compensation Claims Fraud

Dec 22 2022 // A former bus driver for the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority (NFTA) has been sentenced to five years of probation for fraudulently obtaining workers’ compensation benefits by misrepresenting her injuries....

Louisiana Workers’ Comp Rates to Decrease 12.2% in 2023

Dec 22 2022 // Louisiana Insurance Commissioner Jim Donelon has approved the annual loss cost filing of the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) for a -12.2% reduction in workers’ compensation rates. The decrease,...

Tenn. Chalks 10% Cut in Workers’ Comp Loss Costs, Marking a Decade of Reductions

Dec 21 2022 // Tennessee’s insurance commissioner has approved a 10.2% average decrease in workers’ compensation loss costs for the voluntary market, marking the 10th-straight reduction for the state.The Dec. 14 order from...

California Workers’ Comp Bureau Says Premium Fell Sharply Beginning in 2Q 2020

Dec 20 2022 // Written premium declined sharply beginning in the second quarter of 2020 due to the economic downturn resulting from the pandemic, according to a report out on Tuesday.The report from the Workers’ Compensation...

Massachusetts Fines Benefit Manager Over Workers’ Compensation Drug Prices

Dec 20 2022 // Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey announced that a pharmacy benefits manager, Health E Systems, has agreed to pay $275,000 for allegedly failing to follow prescription pricing procedures that are designed to...

OSHA: Amazon Failed to Record Some Warehouse Injuries

Dec 19 2022 // Amazon failed to properly record work-related injuries at warehouses located in five states, a federal agency said Friday while announcing it issued more than a dozen citations during the course of its ongoing...

OSHA Cites Ohio Roofing Contractor for 8th Time

Dec 16 2022 // For the eighth time since 2016, federal safety inspectors say they have found the owner of a Martin roofing company exposing roofers and other workers to the construction industry’s leading cause of death –falls...

Court Defines Insurance Broker’s Duty to Inform LLCs About Workers’ Compensation

Dec 15 2022 // What is the duty of an insurance broker in New Jersey to members of a limited liability corporation (LLC) when it comes to workers’ compensation coverage?The New Jersey Supreme Court this week ruled that a broker has...

People Moves: Workers’ Comp Bureau in California Adds Cooper

Dec 13 2022 // The Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California named Sean Cooper executive vice president and deputy chief actuary. Cooper will assume the WCIRB chief actuary role upon Dave Bellusci’s...

OSHA Fines Arkansas Contractor $287K for Worker Deaths

Dec 9 2022 // Federal workplace safety investigators have determined that an Arkansas construction contractor failed to test oxygen levels in the confined space before two workers entered a sewer 20 feet below ground at an Edmond work...

Report: California Workers’ Comp Public Self-Insured Claim Volume Rose in FY 2021/22

Dec 9 2022 // California’s public self-insured workforce rose less than 1% in the 12 months ending June 30, but the total number of public self-insured work injuries and illness claims reported to the state jumped 35%, as the...