Mo. Businesses Get Refunds for Workers’ Comp Overcharges

Missouri businesses paid too much for their workers’ compensation insurance policies and have received refunds of nearly $2.5 million, state insurance officials said this week.

The National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI) in 2005 found that its rate-making system erroneously omitted historical payroll information in some areas for 2003, 2004 and 2005, the state Department of Insurance said. That resulted in insurers calculating expected losses higher than they should have and charging higher premiums to some businesses, the department said.

Insurance companies reviewed roughly 51,000 policies, and about 21,000 were affected by the error, making the average refund $121. But the overcharges varied, as one Missouri business received $107,259 back, the state department said.