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Worker’s compensation:
STORY: VINCENT NIGLIO
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lorida law requires businesses to carry Worker’s Compensation for their employees. In the insurance world, we call this a mandatory fixed commodity. Before 2004, Florida was one of the most expensive states for Worker’s Compensation, second only to California for rates. Gov. Jeb Bush signed S.B. 50-A into law completely changing the business landscape. S.B. 50-A (Senate Bill 50-A) is comprised of 148 sections that place guidelines on Worker’s Compensation, known as the 440 statutes. As a result, rates for class codes dropped dramatically, saving businesses thousands of dollars per year. Florida is now in the middle nationally with class code rates. There are five main parts to the 440 statutes that should become familiar to
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business owners. Schedule (A) has four parts. They are death benefits, medical expense benefits, indemnity benefits, and the PIR (permanent impairment rating) schedule. Schedule (B) has one part, called Employer’s Liability, and this is the third-party aspect of Worker’s Compensation. I want to focus on two sections of the 440 statutes that pertain to Schedule (A) and the recent rulings in the Florida Supreme Court. State Statute 440.15 and 440.34 were both attacked and defeated in a court of law. The first case, Marvin Castellanos vs. Next Door Company, determined that restrictions on attorney fees for Worker’s Comp cases were unconstitutional, and §440.34 was thrown out on April 28 last year. It was 42 days later, on June 9, the case
