R&R Insurance Blog

Wouldn't it be great to have some sort of system in place to stop workplace injuries, fatalities and equipment damage situations before they occurred? If your company created a near-miss (close call) reporting culture, it would move a long way toward achieving that goal.

There are several benefits to having a near-miss reporting culture in place, including these:

1. It enables companies to pro-actively resolve hazards before a tragic or costly incident occurs.
2. It engages the workforce (all workers at all levels) in solving problems.
3. It increases safety ownership and reinforces workers' self-esteem.
4. It exposes valuable information that otherwise might not be discussed.
5. It develops a positive and necessary attitude surrounding safety.

When it comes to creating a near-miss reporting culture, supervisors play a key role in education and awareness building efforts.

Make Reporting a Daily Event

Many employees are either reluctant to report near-misses, are unaware of the importance of doing so, or simply don't know the reporting process. So how do you encourage the reporting habit? Here's a good tip from John Brengosz, Loss Control Representative, from R&R Insurance Services, and a current manufacturing client:

We're a manufacturing plant working with fabricated metal. We have a pre-shift at the beginning of each shift to review the daily schedule and line assignments and ask if there were any near misses the day before. These are written on a dry erase board with the date and Production Line number:

Annual benchmarking survey provides new insight on the impact of cost reductions within employer's risk management programs.

During the recession, companies slashed their risk costs by 3.1%, a recent study found. As a result, a major catastrophe could test their ability to respond. Article provided by cfo.com.

http://www.cfo.com/article.cfm/14511787

For many years, R&R Insurance has been a member of Assurex Global. Through this partnership, we have relationships with other similar insurance agencies in all 50 states, and in 90 countries. As one of the members of R&R's International Team, we will post emerging insurance topics related to other countries in this blog. Currently, we do have clients with locations here in the Midwest, but also have brick-and-mortar in other countries like China, Germany, Canada, Mexico, and others. In addition, we also have many clients that have exposures related to import/export with other countries as well.

This article was sent to us by our friends at Assurex Global in case we have clients with operations in Spain or Portugal:

Spain and Portugal Make Environmental Liability Insurance/Guarantees a Requirement

If you are an Employer with physical operations in Spain or Portugal, this environmental liability update provided by Chartis will offer some useful background information. It also shows other European countries that will face these requirements over the next few years.

The article is from Chartis, but there are other carriers besides Chartis that can offer this coverage. If you are concerned about this environmental compliance, we would be happy to coordinate a conference call between your company and one of our Assurex partners in Spain or Portugal.

http://www.assurexglobal.com/newsletter/ChartisSpainPortugalUpdate.5.10.pdf

Fred Hosier from Safetynewsalert.com posted an article that I feel is important for employers in Wisconsin to be aware of - I do also recommend taking a look at his website as he has some very good safety knowledge to offer.

If a company fails to provide safety training required by federal law to 11 employees, can the employer be fined just once or 11 times?

A federal court says the government can fine the company 11 times.

The decision comes in the case of employer Erik Ho. He hired 11 workers to renovate a building containing asbestos.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) found Ho failed to train them about asbestos removal or provide them with respirators, two violations of federal safety regulations.

OSHA issued 22 citations to Ho. On appeal, the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, an independent appeals board, found that the existing regulations didn’t allow OSHA to issue 22 separate citations. Instead, Ho faced just two fines.

In response, OSHA changed its regulations in late 2008 to allow for per-employee fines for lack of safety training and personal protective equipment.

That regulation was challenged by the National Association of Home Builders and other groups. They argued that OSHA had no authority to specify whether citations could be issued on a per-employee basis.

Now a federal court has ruled that OSHA is allowed to make such changes to federal workplace safety regulations.

What does that mean for employers? The maximum OSHA fine for one serious violation is $70,000. Multiply that fine by 11 employees, and it becomes $770,000.

Cite: National Association of Home Builders v. OSHA, U.S. Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit, No. 09-1053, 4/16/10.

The property and casualty insurance industry had more than $19 billion of reserve redundancy at the end of 2009—a majority of which will be released this year and the next, according to Morgan Stanley.

A recent report on the p&c market from Morgan Stanley Investment Research said most of these reserves are in the workers’ compensation, medical malpractice and personal auto liability lines, and could be a source of future earnings as they are released.

Morgan Stanley also said the current p&c soft market will not turn hard until the industry feels a reserve deficiency, negative operating profits and adverse development. Morgan Stanley predicted that this will likely not happen until 2013.

An industry-wide drop to negative operating profits “requires profitability to shrink by $50 billion from underwriting losses,” such as from a natural or man-made catastrophe, social inflation, unforeseen product losses or a combination of these factors.

Morgan Stanley analysts see pricing down about 1 percent in 2010 and 2011—a 4 percent decrease in commercial lines and a 3 percent increase in personal lines.

Right now the industry has plenty of capital, reserve redundancy and operating profits, Morgan Stanley said.

The outlook for investors puts p&c excess capital at more than $100 billion, using a metric of premiums to surplus ratio. The amount is at an all-time high, Morgan Stanley said.

R&R Insurance's Resource Center has put together a 2009 vs. 2010 class code rate comparison detailing the percentage increase or decrease.

Class code rates are determined by the amount of dollars spent on work-related injuries in a particular class code (typically by insurance carriers) which are then reported to the WCRB. All companies in Wisconsin contribute to the rate change of a particular class code. Therefore, if you and other businesses with the same class codes had a good safety record over the past few years, you all benefit by receiving a decreased class code rate per $100 of payroll. You can see that change in a class code like 3082 - Steel Foundries - Almost a $4 decrease per $100 of payroll.

We often comment that you can't control the rates in WI - they are what they are, and the only things that change the price of your work comp premium is the experience mod, and the workers compensation dividend (which have been ultra-aggressive this year). But, as an industry, you do impact the overall rate based on your individual performance and contribution to the "whole."

One more thought..
The WCRB sets the premium rate for each class with the approval of the Commissioner of Insurance. If you feel that your business is not properly classified or the premium charge is not proper, you can appeal to the WCRB for review of your situation. If you are still not satisfied with the WCRB’s decision, you may request, in writing, that the Commissioner of Insurance hold a hearing to review the WCRB’s decision.

A job safety analysis (JSA) is not always best left only to a safety supervisor. Your workers' experience in doing a job gives them superb knowledge of what can go wrong from a safety and health standpoint.

While some hazards can be obvious to everyone, many workers probably encounter situations that haven't been considered by others. Your workers' insights are vital.

Conducting a JSA is also valuable as a training guide for new employees, a "refresher" for existing employees and as a tool for determining why an incident happened.

John Brengosz, loss prevention specialist at R&R, is a resource I consistently offer to my clients as he has extensive experience in conducting JSA's. The other piece is that John has a real talent for getting supervisors to "buy into" the process, which can often times be half the battle. Currently, I have a client doing JSA's department by department and the response by the supervisors and the employees has been terrific. Now, evaluating the work station at the beginning of a worker's shift has simply become a natural "step one" before work begins - It's just a part of the culture!

If you would like to know more about how we help our clients conduct JSA's, keep their employees more safe, and ultimately, make them more profitable, please contact me.

A loading dock worker was loading drywall onto a flatbed truck when a forklift being operated by a co-worker surged forward, fatally pinning him against the truck.

At another workplace, a textile plant supervisor was operating a forklift truck when another forklift fell from a loading dock, causing the supervisor's forklift to flip over. He was crushed under the roll cage and died.

And elsewhere, a warehouse worker died after he was crushed between a reversing semi-trailer and a loading dock. Investigators believe that he was likely paying more attention to the contents of the trailer than to where he was standing.

Loading docks are busy places where machine operators and truck drivers must perform a delicate dance around workers on foot. Along with being congested, loading docks may also be poorly lit, slippery, cramped, crowded with debris, riddled with blind spots and crisscrossed with ramps, stairways and uneven surfaces.

Here are just 5 of the possible hazards:

1. Slips, trips and falls;
2. The possibility of workers on foot being struck by vehicles;
3. Being crushed by unstable loads that shift suddenly;
4. The possibility of a forklift driving over the edge of the dock and having it or its load land on workers below; and
5. The possibility of a trailer whose wheels aren't properly chocked creeping forward or backward into workers.

Loading docks are a hub of activity. Workers need to be trained on how they can protect themselves. If you would like to know more about how R&R is helping keep its clients more safe in this particular area, please contact a knowledge broker.