There are model notices available from the Department of Labor at the links below: 

If you do not offer healthcare insurance to employees, go to: http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/pdf/FLSAwithoutplans.pdf

If you do offer healthcare insurance to employees, go to: http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/pdf/FLSAwithplans.pdf

You or your employees can go to www.healthcare.gov  to learn more about the new law.  As always, we will do our best to keep you up to date on new legal requirements that affect you.

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A suggestion is an idea that will benefit the business by solving a problem, reducing costs, improving operations or procedures, enhancing customer service, eliminating waste or spoilage, or making it a better or safer place to work.

One of the most efficient and economical ways to gather new ideas is through the use of the people who know your operations intimately – your employees. Listening to and acting upon sensible employee suggestions presents the opportunity to improve profitability (many employee suggestions relate to wasteful practices and irrational policies) and at the same time increase the level of trust and teamwork within your business.

At a time when businesses are paying consultants and advisors to find newer, better, and faster ways of doing things, sometimes the obvious slips right by because they fail to draw on inside knowledge.

Drawing on internal knowledge is easy! During monthly, quarterly or yearly employee reviews, you can use this time to also accept reviews and ideas from employees, especially if they have limited daily interaction with their manager’s boss. We always let the employee go first because they are sometimes excited about sharing their ideas and this gives us further insight into how they are doing their job. Sometimes it is not even as formal as using this suggestion form below, especially if you are a small company, however some people need the structure of the document we provide below!

Sometimes employees, especially new employees, will not actively volunteer relevant information because they are concerned about the process or if their manager will like their suggestion. If you treat that all suggestions as important and even hold a quarterly or yearly employee meeting to discuss suggestions, your innovation level and ultimately your growth and profit will begin to increase because each employee will begin to take ownership in their idea.

The post Getting Your Employees to Grow YOUR Company: Tool #4 appeared first on Checkbox Accounting.

Tom is an insurance broker and the host of the radio show “Insurance matters”.  His radio show airs every Tuesday at 8 a.m. and the first Saturday of every month at 9:30 a.m. on-line Small Business Talk Radio.  Please let us know your thoughts on this very important topic.

If employers could have influence over their cost of workers’ compensation insurance, wouldn’t they want to know how?

If insurance agents would help their employer clients lower their costs, wouldn’t that be a valuable service?

Most employers consider the renewal date of their workers’ comp policy to be the most important annual date for their policy. Unfortunately, employers have been misinformed by the insurance community and this is NOT the most important annual date.

Yes, the renewal date is when the incumbent carrier offers a new 12 month policy with their rates. This is also the date when the employer’s new Experience Modification (ExMod) is used to modify the rates the employer will pay. The Experience Modification is an important factor that rewards (lowering the Ex-Mod) for employers with little or no claims and penalizes (raises the Ex-Mod) for those employers who have had greater than expected claims for the employer’s industry and size. The application of the Experience Modification is a State process that applies to employers who meet a minimum annual premium. One of the goals of the Experience Modification process is to promote low claims activity and to provide a means to compare that success between employers.

The most important annual date to employers is the review and evaluation of all claims information from the employer’s workers’ compensation carriers before this data is presented to the California Workers’ Compensation Rating Bureau (WCIRB). This data determines the Experience Modification that in turn calculates what the final rates the employer’s incumbent, or any other insurance company, can offer when the policy renews. This event occurs approximately six months into the employer’s policy term. The information provided includes payroll (per classification) and the actual value of each claim the employer may have incurred over the last 4 years. All insurance companies are obligated to use this Experience Modification factor.

Just before the information is sent is the time the claims information needs to be reviewed and perhaps questioned to make sure it is an accurate reflection of the employer’s claims. In my experience, the majority of the value for open claims at this time can be lowered – which will result in a lower Experience Modification factor – which results in a lower future premium paid by the employer. This is really a most important time for employers to be involved – armed with advisors to review claims and audit payroll, the employer has a golden opportunity to reduce their future premiums.

Workers’ compensation is unlike other insurance program. Think of it as a credit line. Use it and you must pay it back plus more. So, workers’ comp is more of a way of financing workers’ comp claims.

It is amazing to me that this most important annual opportunity for employers is continuously ignored by insurance agents, insurance companies, and employers (who typically are not informed of this opportunity). Those employers who know about this process, become immediately engaged, involved and actively participate in this review process.

Any insurance broker, who is not working with their clients to manage this information in an effort to reduce employer’s cost, is doing their client a great disservice. Unfortunately, I continue to see that most insurance agents overlook this important time, because they are either disorganized, do not know what to do, or just don’t care.

Insurance companies also seem to not have any financial incentive to lower employer costs. Even Warren Buffett, Chairman of Berkshire Hathaway, a large insurance holding company, commented that since open claims are like free money – we have all of these extra funds to invest to increase stockholder value and higher profits. (Stockholder Letters)

The post How to Have Real Influence Over Your Workers’ Comp Costs appeared first on Checkbox Accounting.