I have worked in commercial insurance for more than 30 yrs and never seen any exclusion on WC for ex-felons, nor that this was asked on an application or noted by Loss Control. The only area that I’ve seen this be a concern is on crime coverage. On GL, I can see doing a background check and not hiring violent offenders for positions where they have contact with the general public.
In my 35 years in the WC industry with multiple WC carriers, I have never run into anything like this at the carrier level. It is certainly possible that employers have taken a rather jaundiced view of ex-convicts because of obvious issues under the law requiring them to create the safest work environment for their employees as well as productivity and human resource challenges that may arise. I would be interested in hearing anyone’s statutory support for this politician’s assertions that the big, bad insurance companies are to blame for this. Seems fashionable to throw our industry under the bus today, though.
My thoughts as well. Since when does an insurance policy “ban employers” from doing anything? It can exclude coverage, but I think that is the extent of its powers!
I too have a lot of experience in the industry and have never heard of this. Sounds more like someone trying to address an issue and blaming it on the company. The standard WC does not venture into these kind of HR issues and nor should it. Some of our biggest “felons” reside in Washington but have not been locked up yet. But there is still hope
I have worked in commercial insurance for more than 30 yrs and never seen any exclusion on WC for ex-felons, nor that this was asked on an application or noted by Loss Control. The only area that I’ve seen this be a concern is on crime coverage. On GL, I can see doing a background check and not hiring violent offenders for positions where they have contact with the general public.
I would be very interested in seeing where this is written law. Never heard of this in 30 years in the industry.
In my 35 years in the WC industry with multiple WC carriers, I have never run into anything like this at the carrier level. It is certainly possible that employers have taken a rather jaundiced view of ex-convicts because of obvious issues under the law requiring them to create the safest work environment for their employees as well as productivity and human resource challenges that may arise. I would be interested in hearing anyone’s statutory support for this politician’s assertions that the big, bad insurance companies are to blame for this. Seems fashionable to throw our industry under the bus today, though.
My thoughts as well. Since when does an insurance policy “ban employers” from doing anything? It can exclude coverage, but I think that is the extent of its powers!
I too have a lot of experience in the industry and have never heard of this. Sounds more like someone trying to address an issue and blaming it on the company. The standard WC does not venture into these kind of HR issues and nor should it. Some of our biggest “felons” reside in Washington but have not been locked up yet. But there is still hope