Happy Anniversary, sort of. Today is the fourth anniversary of the final effective date of the 2005 Amendments to the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Act.
Editor’s comment: You may not recall but the Amendments started in full force on February 1, 2006. The sweeping changes brought forth in the 2005 Amendments to the Illinois Workers’ Compensation Act had a huge impact on our state’s workers’ compensation law and practice as we know it. Some of the changes were immediate and almost shocking but the full impact of many of the changes is still being felt. While researching the effects of this bill there were portions of it that our attorneys found could be read and interpreted in various conflicting ways and the Commission and courts continue to hash all of it out.
What happened was:
Doctors/medical caregivers providing care to workers comp claimants had to deal with a medical fee schedule for the first time in our history. In exchange, they were to get quicker payment protocols and interest on unpaid bills. We are pretty sure doctors liked the old system more but have grudgingly adapted. We do feel the medical fee schedule has been something of a success and has not resulted in doctors refusing workers’ comp patients. We do consider the surgical “implant” issue to remain an embarrassment that has to be addressed.
Other than medical benefits under the fee schedule, all other workers’ comp benefits went up in numerous and subtle ways—we feel the medical fee savings were wildly overmatched by the increased rates and new TPD and PPD benefits.
Workers’ comp fraud was introduced by our former Governor-waiting-trial almost by mistake and has gone just about nowhere, as our states’ attorneys across the state ignored the pleas of business to take action when clear fraud was present. While we salute the folks at IDFPR for their hard work investigating fraud, we simply don’t see any real impact.
Many of the new changes thought to be beneficial to the businesses and government bodies of Illinois were unclear in how they were to be applied. The jury remains out on utilization review that has not caught on—at the last training session for Illinois arbitrators, it is our understanding UR was given a rousing “thumbs down.” We truly don’t feel this will change until the Commission itself changes, if the election in the fall goes red and not blue.
As we indicate above, in exchange for the medical fee schedule, Illinois labor got a huge increase in various rates, with disability schedule increases and minimum TTD/PPD calculations. We are certain increased benefits encouraged claims of astronomically higher exposure. We truly feel Illinois business now needs caps on skyrocketing reserves for wage loss differential claims, total and permanent disability and death claims that arose from these Amendments. For example, we were listed dead last in 40 states recently surveyed for U.S. workers’ comp costs and outcomes.
Along with the 2005 Amendments to the Act, we saw judicial rulings that we feel increase the overall cost and expense of workers’ comp in our state. We are asking all of our readers for their thoughts on reform—if we put you in charge of Illinois workers’ comp, what would you do different? Please reply with your thoughts and comments.
