Cuomo: employers will save $45M on workers’-compensation costs in 2015

New York employers won’t have pay to pay as much into the state’s workers’-compensation system in 2015, resulting in savings to all employers totaling $45 million.

The state is decreasing the assessment rate to 13.2 percent, down from 13.8 percent, representing the “second consecutive annual decline.”

Gov. Andrew Cuomo made the announcement in a news release his office distributed on Friday morning.

The savings follow Cuomo’s signing of the 2013 Business Relief Act, which “has cut the assessment rate for employers by a total of 30 percent over the last two years.”

The new assessment methodology and other “efficiencies” implemented in 2014 resulted in $170 million in administrative savings, Cuomo’s office said.

The savings include $18 million which directly benefits New York’s public employers, like municipalities and school districts, it added.

The state has applied the savings to 2015, resulting in the decline in the assessment rate, according to the governor’s office.

“Reducing the cost of doing business in New York has been a top priority for this administration and I’m proud to announce that our reforms to the workers’ compensation system have lowered rates for the second straight year,” Cuomo said in the news release.

The Business Relief Act, which Cuomo signed as part of the 2013-14 state budget, “standardized and corrected the previously disjointed and antiquated” assessment process.

Now, all employers are charged with the same methodology, leading to a lower assessment rate for all New York’s employers, Cuomo’s office said.

The New York State Workers’ Compensation Board continues enforcing the legal requirement for employers to carry workers’-compensation insurance, which expands the pool of those insured.

At the same time, both the number of people working in New York and the amount of employees’ total wages earned increased over the last year, contributing to the lower rate, Cuomo’s office explained.

The Workers’ Compensation Board is working on a “business process re-engineering” to re-imagine the workers’-compensation system, according to the governor’s office.

The examination has identified initial projects that will re-create a system that “more effectively” serves the needs of injured workers and employers, resulting in further savings for public and private employers in years to come, Cuomo contends.

Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com