Review of Audit Finds Mistakes: Incorrect Change in Classification Nets $41K Insured The business is a local hauler in the South that handles towing risk. It has 25 employees and does approximately $1.5 million per year in business. Situation Following an audit of the insured’s Workers’ Comp policy, the company was charged an additional premium of $46,000. The company paid the first installment of the additional premium – $26,000 – and was now being called upon to make the second installment of $20,000. Assessment A Certified WorkComp Advisor (CWCA) who had been working with the insured for a number of years reviewed his client’s coverage and performed his own audit of the policy. He found the insurer had incorrectly changed a classification on the audit that had resulted in the additional premium. Besides being the wrong classification for the position in question, the rules governing classification codes in the company’s home state prevent them from being changed in the last 90 days of a policy, as was the case with this change. Initial contact with the insurer was not met with action, but rather with threats for non-payment of the second premium installment. The Advisor continued for several months to work out the situation with the carrier and to get them to admit to the mistake in the classification change. Solution After several months with no result, the CWCA finally got NCCI involved. He had previously worked with NCCI to develop a program for towing risk classification codes – the very same program he had used for his version of the audit that had showed the incorrect change. He sent the results of the audit he performed that indicated the code to have been incorrect and also pointed out that the carrier should not have been allowed to make the change under the rules for classification code changes. After several more months, NCCI accepted the data he had sent and supported his claim that the classification change had been incorrect. Result After more than 10 months of fighting the change to the insured’s classification code, the CWCA’s data finally led to NCCI ruling that the additional premium should only have been $5,000, not $46,000. The insured was instructed not to make the second payment of $20,000 and is now awaiting a return of premium check for $21,000. Although the carrier is currently disputing NCCI’s decision, the CWCA says, “If I hadn’t gone to the Institute and learned the things I learned, I would have given up on this after a couple months. But relying upon what I learned I knew I was right, so I stuck with it, got the classification fixed and got my client’s premium reduced.”