When you're setting up your insurance coverage, one part that you need to think about is worker's compensation. Here's what you need to know about your rights and responsibilities.
It Only Covers Work Injuries
Worker's compensation does not cover injuries that the employee received outside of work hours and duties. There may be some gray area for whether an injury was work related. For instance, if an employee injures himself on work property while off-hours or even while not permitted to be on the property, you will still need to submit workers compensation paperwork in order to see whether the claim is valid or not.
Laws Vary by State
Worker's compensation is delivered to your workers by your state. The laws for minimum coverage and other statistics vary based on your state and the line of work that you're in, so check with your insurer to see how much coverage you need.
What Worker's Compensation Covers
Your insurance will need to cover all of the employee's medical expenses for the accident. Worker's compensation will cover about one half to two thirds of the employee's wages. The amount of time that worker's compensation is valid depends on the type of injury and the recovery time allowed by the health care professional. Your employee will be responsible for submitting medical records and examinations to the insurance company in order to validate the worker's compensation insurance payments.
Employers Can Control Their Spending
Although worker's compensation is a necessity, there are several ways that companies can control their spending on these insurance policies. A full coverage plan will cover all of an employee's medical bills and wages during the recovery phase. This type of plan limits the employer's risk by helping them to eliminate unforeseen medical costs for their employees. An alternative would be to have a plan with a very high deductible; these plans would place the risk back on the employer but allow them to have a much lower monthly payment.
Employers also have the option of getting an individual insurance plan for their company, or to go through a group plan with their associated industry. Construction, teaching, and other industries will have their own associated worker's compensation plans, so check with the associations related to your industry.
Worker's compensation is put in place to mitigate the risk of all parties whenever a worker is performing work that could relate in injury. In order to see what your responsibilities are for providing worker's compensation, speak with a qualified lawyer who specializes in worker's compensation.
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