| RISK MANAGEMENT AND LOSS CONTROL SERVICES
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As insurance markets fluctuate, it is important for companies to address their loss control programs to avoid premium increases and stringent underwriting requirements. Our risk management and loss control services department is dedicated to assisting our clients in preventing losses before they can occur and reducing their cost if they do occur. We also provide risk management support for clients with self-insured or large deductible programs by providing both a loss control and a proactive claims management program.
We offer three key service areas:
Risk Management
Loss Control
Claims Management
With certain lines of coverage, including workers’ compensation and property, the impact of losses is felt immediately. For some others, such as liability coverage, it may take months even years until the impact is felt due to court availability and other local considerations. However, one thing is certain, companies that are concerned with premium costs should be concerned with controlling losses.
The Bottom Line
We can help your company gain a competitive edge by:
• Preventing costly injuries
• Minimizing your business’ exposure to loss
• Controlling costs associated with losses
• Improving productivity
• Increasing employee morale
Our Risk Management Services department helps bring costs under control by performing the following procedures:
RISK ASSESSMENT
• Identifying hazards and providing solutions to either eliminate or minimize them, which will help eliminate the accidents or incidents that could be caused by these hazards.
• Providing assistance both for industrial, mercantile and office services operations to help develop ergonomic solutions to minimize cumulative trauma and other muscular trauma disorders. This could involve training, reconfiguring workstations or other workflow changes to both increase efficiency and provide more comfort for the workers.
• Developing feasible and practical, real world solutions to loss control issues keeping in mind that these solutions must be kept within the economic resources of the business.
LOSS CONTROL
• Providing replacement cost evaluations for buildings to assure the building is insured to value.
• Working with clients to develop, implement and monitor loss control programs. Due to regulatory requirements and good safety practices there are certain loss control elements that must be provided to employees. A loss control program can be tailored to provide these without being overly cumbersome to manage. One size does not fit all so providing that which is necessary without adding that which is germane is the key to a successful program.
• Providing clients with on-site client services including:
• Physical surveys to identify and provide solutions to eliminate or minimize potential hazards in the workplace or location.
• Audit existing loss control programs with the idea of effectiveness and applicability.
• Regulatory compliance surveys and/or audits to assess how clients are dealing with regulatory guidelines from federal, state and municipalities.
• Training for management and employees areas such as manual material handling, hazard communication, van and straight truck defensive driving courses.
• From loss runs, analyzing claims to find if there are any trends and from here develop methods or systems to reduce these.
• Establishing insurers’ special instructions for loss control and claims services to fit client specifications, monitor both loss control and claims services and coordinate the services to maximize utilization for clients.
• Serving as a technical resource for clients or regulatory issues, accepted guidelines and good safety practices, as many of our clients do not have this capability in-house. This includes O.S.H.A. updates, classification issues and jurisdictional issues.
• Assisting clients in establishing self-insured medical payment programs, return to work programs, and commercial building replacement cost evaluations
CLAIMS MANAGEMENT
• Performing a thorough, periodic claims review on-site to ensure proper claim handling by carrier of Third Party Administrator (T.P.A.).
• Assuring that claims reserves are adequate for the cases. This could be either under-funded or over-funded and either way could have an impact on the cost of insurance.
• Working with carriers or T.P.A. to close claims in a timely manner as experience has shown the longer a claim stays open, the more costly it becomes.
• Providing claims follow-up with carriers and/or T.P.A.’s to see where it is reasonable to seek surveillance on claimants, get independent medical examinations or where continuing medical care is requested.
• Assuring second injury fund application is sent to the state or workers’ compensation cases where applicable.
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