The California Department of Insurance (CDI) responded May 20 to a recommendation
to implement a mid-year pure
premium rate increase.
Making the increase official, California Insurance Commissioner Harry Low
said, "I hereby approve an increase in the advisory pure premium rates
for workers' compensation insurance of 10.1 percent. The increase was recommended
by the Workers' Compensation Insurance Rating Bureau of California (WCIRB)
and no comments in opposition to this increase have been received."
The WCIRB advised the CDI to increase the advisory premium rate at a public
hearing March 28. Another hearing was held May 14 in San Francisco on the matter,
which cleared the way for the increase.
The pure premium rate represents the actual cost of claims or loss cost. It
is the recommended level of motor oil to keep a carrier's system from seizing.
The mid-year adjustment is a way for the CDI to tell carriers that they are
burning oil and need to put a couple of quarts of 10W-30 into their systems.
The increase will bring the pure premium rate inline with the actual cost of
claims and the carriers' dipsticks will read "full."
This is the second increase for 2002, following a Jan 1 increase of 10.2 percent.
Adjuster / Examiner Claims Examiner Santa Ana Unified School District Santa Ana, CA