California’s Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau is considering requesting a 30 percent increase in pure premium rates for 2011 policies.
The news that California’s Workers’ Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau (WCIRB) might ask for the increase came out of a meeting of the bureau’s actuarial committee. That committee makes a recommendation to the WCIRB’s governing committee, and then the governing committee makes the request to the states Department of Insurance. The governing committee is scheduled to meet next week, and will be considering the recommendation then, said the WCIRB’s communications director.
The Department of Insurance has rejected the past two rate increases the WCIRB has requested, a 24% increase request last July and a 23% request this past January.
That is part of the reason for the current 30% request. Other reasons are that medical costs have been rising, 12 percent per year since 2007, and that there was a less than expected fall off in the number of claims made in 2009, given the fact that so many jobs have been lost in the present economic recession.