Risk & Insurance Online

Workers' compensation rates in Kentucky have declined for the fourth consecutive year, state officials said.

The National Council on Compensation Insurance's 2009 filing, recently approved by the Kentucky Department of Insurance, showed an average reduction in loss costs of 6.4 percent for the 598 industrial classing used in the state. These classes include manufacturing, office and clerical, contracting, and goods and services. For coal classes, underground mining costs dropped 20.4 percent while surface mining decreased 13.1 percent. The new rates go into effect Oct. 1.

Data collected from insurance carriers is used to develop loss costs, which is the average compensation for lost wages, based on the level of disability, plus medical benefit payments. Use of the information is voluntary, but most workers' comp carriers use the NCCI loss cost values as a base to which the insurer's own loss adjustment and overhead expenses are added to arrive at the rates charged to employers in Kentucky.

California: Reforms have reduced attorney involvement in permanent disability claims (12/07/09)
Massachusetts: Study finds workers' comp medical payments low, but steadily increasing (09/03/09)
Reinsurance industry largely unscathed by financial crisis, report finds (01/29/09)
California: Insurance commissioner urges rating bureau to withdraw comp rate increase (06/01/09)
NCCI offers guarded short-term, cautionary long-term outlook for market (06/15/09)

Sharon P. Clark, insurance commissioner, noted that the report shows a continuing decline in the number of workplace injuries in the state and the severity of those claims.

Read more at the WORKERSCOMP Forum^TM homepage.

September 25, 2009

Newsletter Sign-up