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Steve Kessler: Good morning. Everyone. Welcome to the Infinit-I Fast Forward Webinar Series.

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Steve Kessler: My name is Steve Kessler, and I’m going to host the program today.

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Steve Kessler: We’ve got a topic. I think that we need to be talking about a little bit more than we generally do

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Steve Kessler: today. We’re going to talk about workers. Comp.

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Steve Kessler: And the top 10 injuries that are associated with work, comp and trucking.

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Steve Kessler: And you know we talk an awful lot about insurance in the trucking business, but this is one that

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Steve Kessler: we don’t talk about very much, and

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Steve Kessler: trucking is a dangerous business. So, there are a lot of injuries, and we’re very happy to have our guest on to talk about how we can help manage that risk. A couple of housekeeping things, obviously those of you that are logged in or muted, so we can’t hear you. So, if you want to communicate with us, you can type your question or comment in the chat box that you’ll see there in the tray at the bottom.

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Steve Kessler: and there’s a Q&A box. So, if you have a question, you can type it in either one of those places, and we’ll try to answer your questions.

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Steve Kessler: probably toward the end of the presentation, and then we’ll try to answer as many of those as we can.

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Steve Kessler: I also want to introduce to all of you our co-host, Mark Rhea, those of you that have been on our webinars this year in the last couple of years are familiar with Mark

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Steve Kessler: Mark’s a transportation executive. Been at it 35 plus years. He’s a certified director of safety.

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Steve Kessler: and he’s on the board of several different organizations that all relate to safety. And Mark was a commissioned army officer. So, Mark, what are your thoughts about the program today?

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Mark Rhea: Well, I think this is

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Mark Rhea: topic that does not get enough attention. We are all familiar with

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Mark Rhea: landing gears and hooking up airlines and getting in and out of a truck and

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Mark Rhea: and work injuries that are in our industry, and they can

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Mark Rhea: reach out to the warehouse guys getting in and out of a trailer.

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Mark Rhea: getting the product the freight into and out of a trailer be hazardous

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Mark Rhea: asked to see the lease, so

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Mark Rhea: content that that Infinit-I has is available this afternoon to make your get some training out there to make these hazards more obvious to your staff. So really looking forward to Keith

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Mark Rhea: presentation today and work injuries are real, alive, and we need to address them.

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Steve Kessler: Very good. Thanks, Mark.

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Steve Kessler: Well, let me introduce our guest. Everyone. Our guest today is Keith Wertz Keith is the Vice President of Lost control at Midwestern Insurance Alliance. Keith has a long relationship with our company, by the way.

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Steve Kessler: better than 30 years of experience in managing workers, compensation, risk, and insurance for various industries with strong emphasis on transportation, partial delivery, and wood products. Keith is a certified Director of Safety

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Steve Kessler: from North American Transportation Management Institute, and has authored 2 books on workers, compensation and injury reduction.

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Steve Kessler: I should also say that Keith is a prolific content creator, and, as a matter of fact, in our Library of Content.

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Steve Kessler: Keith has over a hundred 7 short videos that are called Real life lessons which are great pieces of content that describe all kinds of

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Steve Kessler: of places where injuries can happen, cargo securement and cleaning tractors and trailers, and connecting glad hands, and strapping and chaining freight and tarping and trailer, landing gear, and all those kinds of things that you all know can cause problems. So, without any further delay, Keith, I’m going to let you take it away.

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Keith Wertz: Fantastic. I want to thank vertical Alliance group for inviting me to speak. So, as Steve mentioned, I’m part of the loss control team at Midwestern Insurance Alliance

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Keith Wertz: for those not familiar with Midwestern Insurance Alliance. We’re a worker’s comp provider with a very strong focus in the trucking industry.

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Keith Wertz: In addition to workers. Compensation, midwestern insurance offers occupational accident coverage to independent contractors.

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Keith Wertz: although midwestern insurance alliance doesn’t directly provide other lines of insurance, we are a proud part of the K 2 insurance company, which has a broad spectrum of insurance products for the trucking industry and other industries, as well as some personal lines, insurance products.

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Steve Kessler: Good.

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Keith Wertz: So recently, we conducted a study of workers. Comp claims in the trucking industry that spanned 2 years, 2022, and 2023.

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Keith Wertz: That study included approximately 1,300 trucking companies across the United States, and it’ll be the basis for a lot of this webinar.

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Keith Wertz: It’s my hope that you’ll walk away from this webinar with a solid understanding of the top sources of workers. Comp claims in the trucking industry.

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Keith Wertz: It’s also my goal that you’ll learn some practical steps to address those sources of injuries.

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Keith Wertz: We’ll also talk about conducting your own analysis of incidents and the importance of engaging your employees in getting them to help identify ways to prevent injuries.

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Keith Wertz: Lastly, we’ll talk about workers. Comp experience rating at a very high level. My goal with that’s merely to make you understand how past actions or inactions related to safety management

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Keith Wertz: could be impacting what you’re paying for workers Comp today.

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Keith Wertz: And I also want you to understand that what you’re doing now

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Keith Wertz: can impact your premiums favorably for several years to come.

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Keith Wertz: I feel the need to also tell you what you won’t get from this webinar. So you’re not going to get answers to questions about what’s compensable and what’s not compensable as a workers comp claim, or what the specific benefits are for different things. And one of the reasons for that is that I’m not a claim specialist.

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Keith Wertz: We have a staff of very knowledgeable claims folks that I rely on a lot to answer my questions relating to those things. But another reason is that

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Keith Wertz: workers Comp is not just 1 1 system.

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Keith Wertz: There’s actually a different worker’s comp system in each State. So, each State has its own unique

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Keith Wertz: rules, its own requirements, its own benefit structure. And although there’s significant similarities between state workers Comp systems, there’s no 2 state workers Comp systems that are identical.

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Steve Kessler: Interesting.

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Keith Wertz: Before jumping in. I wanted to lay some groundwork, because it’s quite possible that some of the folks on this webinar have not dealt with workers Comp. Before, or know very little about it.

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Keith Wertz: With very few exceptions, employers in the United States are required to have workers comp coverage

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Keith Wertz: in very broad terms. Workers. Compensation pays the medical expenses

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Keith Wertz: and the wage replacement benefits associated with work-related injuries and illnesses.

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Keith Wertz: Also, workers comp provides disability and death benefits for work related injuries.

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Keith Wertz: Another thing about workers Comp is that it is no fault. Insurance also workers. Compensation is

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Keith Wertz: primary insurance, which means that it serves as the 1st source of coverage for work related injuries or illnesses.

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Keith Wertz: If, for example, one of your drivers is injured in a crash on the job.

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Keith Wertz: and another driver is at fault.

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Keith Wertz: Workers. Compensation will pay the medical expenses and the lost wage benefits, and then will subrogate against the at-fault party to recover what was spent.

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Keith Wertz: So, truth be told, there’s not many insurance companies who are eager to write workers compensation for a trucking company, and I wanted to talk just a little bit about why, that is, there’s several things that make trucking unique with respect to workers. Comp.

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Keith Wertz: You know. First, consider the workplace

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Keith Wertz: for a manufacturer, a warehouse, a retail store, or most other businesses. The workplace is a fixed location

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Keith Wertz: for those industries. The employer has total control over the workplace.

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Steve Kessler: Yeah.

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Keith Wertz: Not so for a trucking company.

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Keith Wertz: Most of your employees spend most of their time away from your facility.

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Keith Wertz: Their workplace is virtually limitless, and for the most part

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Keith Wertz: you have absolutely no control over it.

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Keith Wertz: although you might be able to compensate for it.

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Keith Wertz: You can’t control the poor road design that created a traffic hazard. You can’t control the ice on the sidewalk of a rest stop that caused your driver to slip and fall.

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Keith Wertz: and you can’t control the inattentive driver who crosses the center line and runs into your truck.

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Keith Wertz: So, another thing that makes workers comp a challenge for trucking companies is that for most trucking companies it’s difficult to gather employees collectively for safety training.

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Keith Wertz: That’s 1 of the reasons that Midwestern insurance Alliance is a big fan of the Infinit-I platform and other online training platforms, because they help to solve that problem by providing training to drivers regardless of where they are

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Keith Wertz: so. So, what else makes a trucking company unique with respect to workers compensation?

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Keith Wertz: Yeah, consider this fact. Most of your employees work without direct supervision. Almost all the time.

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Keith Wertz: Hopefully, your company is using telematics and dash cameras. If so, you can make up for the absence of direct supervision. To some extent, however, that generally only applies to when the employee is behind the wheel.

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Keith Wertz: For the most part you can’t observe, and correct employees who are outside of the truck cab, which is where most of the injuries occur.

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Keith Wertz: So

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Keith Wertz: if your drivers aren’t using 3 points of contact while getting in and out of the truck cab. If they’re spinning the landing gear with one finger, or if they’re jumping out of the back of the trailer, chances are you’re never going to know about it, at least not until it results in an injury.

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Steve Kessler: You’re getting it.

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Keith Wertz: Not only that the fact that they work without direct supervision also makes it hard

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Keith Wertz: to question the legitimacy of a workers. Comp. Plan that you think might be questionable

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Keith Wertz: for an employer in manufacturing construction, retail or other industries. Lots of times there’s witnesses that can either substantiate or refute what the injured employee says.

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Keith Wertz: You just don’t often have that luxury in the trucking industry.

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Keith Wertz: Okay, so the bulk of your employees spend most of their time in a workplace that you have no control over.

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Keith Wertz: They can rarely get together for collective safety training.

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Keith Wertz: and they work without direct supervision almost all the time.

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Keith Wertz: On top of that the Bureau of Labor Statistics says that the transportation industry is generally considered to have an incident rate that’s higher than most other industries.

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Keith Wertz: Now consider one of the statements that I made earlier about there not being just one workers comp system, but 50 plus workers compensation systems throughout the United States.

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Keith Wertz: Many trucking companies operate at least to some extent in all 48 contiguous States.

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Keith Wertz: It’d be nice if all the States followed the same rules, but they don’t.

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Keith Wertz: plus, jurisdictional lines can get blurry.

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Keith Wertz: And although that’s not something that most other businesses must worry about, it’s a concern for most every trucking company

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Keith Wertz: a lot of times a trucking company is in one state. An injured driver lives in another state.

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Keith Wertz: and a workers Comp. Claim occurs in a 3rd state.

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Keith Wertz: In that scenario the truck driver, particularly if coached by an attorney, might petition to be covered by workers. Compensation in the State that pays the highest benefits.

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Keith Wertz: But that’s not it, either. The trucking industry has an employee turnover rate that’s higher than most other industries and higher rates of employee turnover often correlate with higher rates of employee injuries.

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Keith Wertz: Lastly, consider the general health of the truck driver population. Not good right.

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Keith Wertz: whether it’s the sedentary nature of the job, the lack of good truck stops food, a lack of personal responsibility, or the failure on the part of management to effectively promote health and wellness with drivers.

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Keith Wertz: Truck drivers are not the picture of health.

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Keith Wertz: and, as studies have shown, obese workers Comp. Claims are more likely to to miss more days of work.

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Keith Wertz: They’re likely to have higher medical costs, and they’re more likely to become permanently disabled because of a work-related injury.

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Keith Wertz: Good!

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Keith Wertz: You might even be able to add a few more things to that list about what makes workers Comp a unique challenge for trucking companies, but it’s sufficient to say that that handling workers comp and trucking is harder than it is in most other industries.

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Keith Wertz: So normally, when you when you see injury statistics, you’ll see the injury categorized in in a

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Keith Wertz: a few general ways that might be by the body part affected like the head or the ankle or the back, it might be by the type of injury, like a laceration or a strain, or a fracture, or it might be by the mechanism of injury. In those cases, injuries are categorized by things like slips, trips, and falls, falls from elevations, or being struck by a falling or flying object.

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Keith Wertz: Each of those ways of categorizing injuries may be good for statisticians, but they have very limited value for safety directors who want more actionable information.

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Keith Wertz: So, when Midwestern’s lost control team meets with a particular company, or we look at a particular industry, we tend to categorize claims based on what work task the employee was performing at the time that they were injured.

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Keith Wertz: and I’d suggest that you do the same if you want to categorize your company’s entries

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Keith Wertz: in the study that I referenced a little bit earlier. We identified 50 specific work tasks in which employees of trucking companies were injured.

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Keith Wertz: We’re not going to go through all 50 of them, but we will look at the top. 10.

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Keith Wertz: So just a point of clarification here when we’re talking about the top sources of injuries in trucking. We’re looking at the frequency of claims, not the cost of those claims.

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Keith Wertz: which is what we refer to as the severity.

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Keith Wertz: We do that because all too often the severity of an injury is determined by luck.

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Keith Wertz: and to illustrate what I’m talking about here. I wanted to share 2 actual injuries.

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Keith Wertz: In one claim. A driver missed a step getting out of his truck, and he fell.

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Keith Wertz: fell to the ground. He reported it to his employer, but he never sought any medical attention for it, and the claim had no loss.

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Keith Wertz: at least in terms of workers. Compensation

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Keith Wertz: in the other claim a driver had the exact same incident he was getting out of his truck. He missed a step. He fell to the ground, however, that claim incurred a loss of more than $300,000.

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Keith Wertz: The difference was largely due to luck how those drivers hit the ground when they fell.

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Keith Wertz: So, with that in mind, let’s jump into the to the top 10 most frequent sources of workers comp injuries.

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Keith Wertz: So, let’s start with the category in the top spot

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Keith Wertz: with 21% of the workers Comp claims stemming from motor vehicle crashes. That was the single largest category of workers. Comp claims from our study

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Keith Wertz: at the risk of pointing out the obvious. If 21% of the workers Comp claims in the trucking industry stem from motor vehicle crashes, that means that nearly 80% do not.

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Keith Wertz: So

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Keith Wertz: if your safety efforts are focused almost exclusively on driving safety and dot compliance, you’re probably failing to address nearly 80% of your workers comp claim exposure.

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Keith Wertz: Yep.

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Keith Wertz: that said I, do want to point out something here. The average cost of a worker’s comp claims from a motor vehicle. Crash in the trucking industry far exceeds the average cost of other claims

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Keith Wertz: so, based on our two-year study of trucking companies, the average cost of a workers compensation claims from a motor vehicle. Crash is $146,000. The average cost of other workers’ compensation claims was $34,000.

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Keith Wertz: That’s a big difference.

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Keith Wertz: although I’m going to share the average claims cost for each of the categories that we’ll discuss in this webinar.

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Keith Wertz: I I want to make something clear. I work for a worker’s comp provider. So, when I’m referring to the incurred cost of a claim.

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Keith Wertz: I’m referring only to the direct cost, which is the amount that’s been paid, or the amount that’s been held in reserves to be paid for. That workers Comp claim

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Keith Wertz: in many circumstances. That’s just the tip of the iceberg for you.

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Keith Wertz: You need to consider the cost associated with the disruption to your business hiring and training replacement employee. In some circumstances the impact on morale that claims have and a lot more.

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Keith Wertz: Don’t

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Keith Wertz: I realize that this is barely skimming the surface on this topic, but in in broad terms we’ve listed a few strategies here related to preventing crashes.

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Keith Wertz: The 1st one that I listed here is, be selective in hiring, if you choose. The right people on the front end and avoid individuals who exhibit a pattern of at-risk behaviors. You’re one step closer to preventing crashes.

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Keith Wertz: The second one listed here is maintain safe equipment.

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Keith Wertz: It’s important to have an effective preventative maintenance program and to ensure that deficiencies are identified and corrected quickly.

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Keith Wertz: Next, and this is a big one is leveraging safety related technology. If you haven’t already, you need to find the safety technology that’s best for you and deploy it.

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Keith Wertz: A lot of this webinar is about data and leveraging that data.

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Keith Wertz: The in-cab technology that’s available to trucking companies today produces an incredible amount of data

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Keith Wertz: and having access to that data and using it will make you a lot more effective than if

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Keith Wertz: ye more effective than you could be if you weren’t using it at all.

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Keith Wertz: And the last one listed here is coaching drivers.

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Keith Wertz: This goes hand in hand with leveraging technology.

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Keith Wertz: I still run into trucking companies that have data at their fingertips.

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Keith Wertz: Data that will help them identify which drivers need coached.

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Keith Wertz: And they’re not using it.

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Keith Wertz: So, having data and not using it to your benefit has the same result as not having it at all.

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Keith Wertz: So, I’ll add one thing to this slide that that I didn’t include, and that is have a 0-tolerance policy for seatbelt violations.

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Keith Wertz: There’s really no excuse for a driver or passenger of a vehicle, let alone an 80,000-pound commercial vehicle to not wear their seat belt.

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Keith Wertz: So, second, on the list of top workers Comp. Claims in trucking is a very generic 1, 1 that we simply refer to as walking. Of course, drivers walk to some degree every time they get out of their truck.

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Keith Wertz: The overwhelming majority of these injuries are slip, trip, and fall. Incidents in which the employee slipped or fell on ice slipped on a slippery surface, tripped over an object.

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Keith Wertz: or they rolled their ankle on uneven ground.

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Keith Wertz: But injuries in this category also involved

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Keith Wertz: injuries such as stepping on a nail

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Keith Wertz: having a foreign object blow into their eye while they’re simply walking from point A to Point B,

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Keith Wertz: or even being struck by a vehicle as they crossed a parking lot in our study.

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Keith Wertz: Injuries to drivers when they were merely walking from point A to point. B represented 11% of the claims and had an average cost of $36,000.

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Keith Wertz: I think some of you’d be shocked to see that just how many of these claims involved employees slipping and falling on ice, one practical strategy to address those claims involves providing strap on traction aids to employees who are likely to encounter icy conditions in their job.

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Keith Wertz: Another practical strategy is to share stories with your employees about incidents that happened to other drivers.

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Keith Wertz: The goal of doing that is to help your employees be more alert to these types of incidents as they go about their workday, in other words, creating

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Keith Wertz: top of mind awareness.

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Keith Wertz: So as Steve

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Keith Wertz: mentioned, at the at the onset of this webinar. There’s over a hundred resources within Infinit-I’s platform

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Keith Wertz: that. That use that strategy of creating top of mind awareness

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Keith Wertz: through stories about what happened to somebody else.

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Keith Wertz: Oh, so I would encourage you if you were

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Keith Wertz: are using the Infinit-I workforce solutions platform to really look at those and to work those into your training schedule?

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Keith Wertz: No.

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Keith Wertz: before we jump into the next one on the top 10 list. I wanted to encourage anybody on this webinar that

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Keith Wertz: the well, to use the chat feature, or

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Keith Wertz: or other features where you can share information on zoom here to

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Keith Wertz: to share other strategies. So if you’ve deployed a different strategy and different than the ones that we’ve mentioned in this webinar, go ahead and use the chat feature to share what you’ve done to address some of these things, and at the end of the webinar we can share some of those things with everyone.

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Steve Kessler: Great, good.

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Keith Wertz: So, a close 3rd on the top. 10 workers. Comp claims

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Keith Wertz: is one that you might have guessed, and that’s getting in and out of the truck cab

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Keith Wertz: most of the time. These incidents involve a driver falling, but not always so. Sometimes the driver prevents a fall because they are using the handholds, but sometimes in those situations they injure their shoulders in the process

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Keith Wertz: other times drivers step down onto the ground and roll their ankle on uneven ground, or something that they failed to see

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Keith Wertz: in our study injuries associated with getting in and out of the truck cab represented 9% of the workers. Compensation claims, and the average cost was $36,000.

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Keith Wertz: Yeah, we’ve listed a few strategies here for addressing those incidents.

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Keith Wertz: One is simply using stickers on the truck or periodic reminders to keep this hazard top of mind.

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Keith Wertz: Another strategy involves training, ensuring that drivers know and use 3 points of contact, and don’t try to carry items while they’re climbing in or out of the truck cab.

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Keith Wertz: The last one listed here is observation and feedback.

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Keith Wertz: That’s more challenging if you have long haul drivers.

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Keith Wertz: but each time they come into your terminal it’s another opportunity to see if they’re putting into practice you’re training and then provide feedback

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Keith Wertz: number 4 on the top workers. Comp claims in the trucking industry is loading and unloading freight.

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Keith Wertz: So

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Keith Wertz: in our categorization, this category does not include injuries from opening trailer doors or even load securement tasks instead. Claims in this category are solely from handling the freight during the loading or unloading process, either manually or using a dolly or a pallet jack.

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Keith Wertz: In our study injuries associated with

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Keith Wertz: handling freight represented 9% of the workers Comp claims and had an average claim cost of $37,000.

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Keith Wertz: If it’s your policy that the freight that you haul is driver, no touch, you may not necessarily be immune from these types of injuries. You might be surprised to see just how many of the claims in this category come from companies that haul driver, not touch freight.

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Keith Wertz: So

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Keith Wertz: consider that. If a driver arrives at a company facility and they’re demanding that that driver unload or if your driver wants to unload or tailgate the freight to expedite the process and get back on the road quicker.

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Keith Wertz: If you don’t have a clear and defined process for telling drivers what to do in those situations.

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Keith Wertz: That’s probably a void that you want to fill.

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Keith Wertz: Also, if drivers use material handling aids, provide training to make sure that they know how to use it safely.

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Keith Wertz: So, number 5 on the top list of workers Comp claims in the trucking industry

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Keith Wertz: is injuries while performing vehicle maintenance.

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Keith Wertz: This could include injuries to drivers as well as injuries to mechanics.

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Keith Wertz: Unfortunately, in some trucking companies the sole focus of their formal safety efforts seems to be on, on drivers.

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Steve Kessler: Remember.

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Keith Wertz: If you have mechanics, you need to have safety management efforts focused on preventing mechanics from being injured as well.

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Keith Wertz: So, in our study injuries associated with performing vehicle maintenance represented 8% of the workers Comp claims and had an average cost of $17,000.

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Keith Wertz: One practical strategy is to have safety meetings at a routine frequency for shop employees.

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Keith Wertz: after all, these employees are much easier to gather together than drivers are.

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Keith Wertz: Another strategy is a safety related recognition or incentive program for your maintenance employees.

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Keith Wertz: People often have very strong views about safety, related recognition or incentive programs. But if you have a program for your drivers. It makes sense to develop a separate one for your mechanics.

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Keith Wertz: Another strategy involves providing tools that make strenuous or difficult tasks less hazardous.

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Keith Wertz: That could be a tool that makes removing a stuck hub, piloted wheel easier, or a tool that makes it easier to handle brake drums or a platform that makes it easier to access the engine compartment.

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Keith Wertz: No, the last strategy listed on this

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Keith Wertz: screen is intentional and frequent observation and feedback.

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Keith Wertz: This is simply acknowledging mechanics when they’re observed performing tasks safely and wearing proper ppe

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Keith Wertz: and coaching them when they’re not

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Keith Wertz: number 6 on the list of top workers comp claims in the trucking industry has to do with injuries sustained while drivers are cranking the trailer landing gear.

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Keith Wertz: This includes injuries sustained by drivers who spin the landing gear or twirl it with one finger.

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Keith Wertz: In those circumstances the crank handle can get away from them, and we often learn about those when the crank handle, hits them in the hand, or smacks them in the forehead.

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Keith Wertz: It involves injuries where, where loaded trailers are dropped too low and driver strain while cranking the landing gear to raise it.

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Keith Wertz: It also involves injuries where there’s internal damage to the worm gears inside the trailer landing gear which makes it get in a bind when they’re cracking it and it kicks back.

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Keith Wertz: Oh.

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Keith Wertz: in our study injuries associated with cranking, landing gear represented 5% of the workers Comp claims and had an average claims cost of $24,000.

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Keith Wertz: So, one strategy for addressing this type of injury is provide hands-on training in orientation that addresses how to properly crank the landing gear

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Keith Wertz: joke

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Keith Wertz: for those of you on this webinar that they use the Infinit-I workforce solutions platform there, there’s good. There’s

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Keith Wertz: a good training video on there that that midwestern created in cooperation with the University of Kentucky called cranking trailer landing gear, so it should be easy to find

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Keith Wertz: also, there. There’s a number of products designed to minimize or eliminate exposure to injury associated with cranking the trailer landing gear.

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Keith Wertz: One’s called the 6 wheel ratchet, which replaces the crank handle with a ratchet type mechanism.

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Keith Wertz: There’s several out there that use an impact drill to raise or lower the landing gear.

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Keith Wertz: There, there’s 1 called Easy Bar. That’s a replacement crank handle that allows you to use 2 hands in a pedal type of motion

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Keith Wertz: to raise and lower the training, the trailer landing gear.

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Keith Wertz: So those are all some strategies that you could use to address that type of injury.

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Keith Wertz: So next, on the top, 10 list are workers. Comp claims that we refer to driving other than crash.

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Keith Wertz: Although we categorized injuries for this study, based on the test that the employee was doing at the time that they were injured, it really didn’t make any sense to lump workers. Comp claims that stem from motor vehicle crashes

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Keith Wertz: with other sources of injuries that happened while the employee was driving.

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Keith Wertz: For that reason, this category of claims includes all injuries sustained while the employee was driving

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Keith Wertz: except crashes. So, these include drivers in the sleeper berth being thrown from the bunk when their co-driver put on the brakes hard. It also includes injuries from carbon monoxide leaking into the truck cab or having the steering wheel jerk when the driver hits a big pothole.

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Keith Wertz: Other injuries in this category include back pain that the that the driver attributes to driving on rough road surfaces

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Keith Wertz: or even heat stress when the truck A/C is not working.

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Keith Wertz: And so in our study injuries associated with these types of injuries or these type of claims represented 4% of the workers Comp claims and had an average cost of $31,000.

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Keith Wertz: One strategy to prevent these types of injuries is merely to ensure proper maintenance of the equipment inside the truck. So, making sure the air ride seat is properly functioning, that the air conditioning is properly functioning, or even adding a Co detector in the truck cab.

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Keith Wertz: And if you’re running with teams, another strategy is to adopt and enforce a sleeper. Birth, restraint, policy.

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Keith Wertz: you know. Number 8 on the top, 10 list of injuries sustained while a driver is opening or closing trailer doors.

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Keith Wertz: These include things like being struck by freight that shifted in transit and falls out while the drivers opening the doors. But it also includes injuries in which the trailer door is blown by the wind, and either strikes the employee or causes an arm or shoulder strain.

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Keith Wertz: Also this category includes injuries where the latch on the trailer door is in a bind, and it’s difficult to unlatch

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Keith Wertz: in our study. Injuries associated with this type of

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Keith Wertz: incident represented. 4% of the workers Comp claims, and the average cost was $18,000.

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Keith Wertz: With respect to protecting drivers from falling freight, one strategy is to provide drivers with a trailer strap that prevents the trailer door from flying open when it’s unlatched. If there’s freight leaning up against the inside of the door.

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Keith Wertz: another strategy is to provide hands-on training and orientation that addresses how to properly open and close trailer doors to avoid injury.

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Keith Wertz: And again, for those on this webinar that use the Infinit-I workforce solutions platform. There’s a good training video that Midwestern Insurance Alliance has provided that addresses that topic.

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Steve Kessler: And Keith. I think it also talks about making sure that the door is secured. If it’s a windy day, something that the wind

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Steve Kessler: would blow the door over, and that could be a serious injury if that happened.

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Keith Wertz: So.

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Keith Wertz: Number 9 is strapping or chaining freight as you could reasonably assume.

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Keith Wertz: Most of these injuries involve trucking companies that pull open deck trailers.

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Keith Wertz: Some of the injuries in this category involve strains or torn rotator cuffs from throwing chains or throwing a strap over a high load.

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Keith Wertz: They also include injuries in which the winch bar slipped out of the winch while the driver was tightening the load securement straps, or when a driver’s struck by a winch bar or a chain binder that kicks back.

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Keith Wertz: So, in our study injuries associated with strapping or chaining freight represented 4% of the claims

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Keith Wertz: and the average claims cost was $50,000

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Keith Wertz: them. One practical strategy is to replace lever type chain binders with ratchet type or recoilless chain binders.

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Keith Wertz: Another strategy is to ensure that that winch bars have a knurled end and a raised tip to help prevent them from slipping out of the winch.

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Keith Wertz: There’s also ratchet type. Winch bars on the market make the task of ratcheting winch straps safer.

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Keith Wertz: And yet another strategy is to train drivers how to throw straps in a manner that minimizes the risk of shoulder injury.

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Keith Wertz: Oh.

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Keith Wertz: rounding out the top! 10 list or injuries sustained while drivers are getting in and out of the getting in and out of trailers.

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Keith Wertz: so

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Keith Wertz: include things like falls while getting in and out of the trailer strains knee injuries from jumping down out of a trailer or stepping on an object or rolling an ankle while getting out of a trailer.

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Keith Wertz: So, in our study injuries associated with getting on or off. A trailer represented 4% of the claims, and the average claims cost was $60,000.

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Keith Wertz: Certainly the most effective strategy would be to eliminate the need for employees to interact. Exit a trailer from the ground. If you’re able to do that.

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Keith Wertz: if you’re not minimizing, it would be the next best strategy.

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Keith Wertz: Another strategy would be to provide portable ladders that fit into the rub rail of an open deck trailer, or attached to the rear of a dry van or reefer trailer

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Keith Wertz: to make it easier for drivers to get in and out

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Keith Wertz: you could also provide fixed handholds or additional steps to make it easier to get it in and out of the trailer.

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Keith Wertz: And again, one more time. If you use Infinit-I workforce solution, there’s a good training video in there that midwestern made in cooperation with the University of Kentucky that that addresses getting in and out of the back of a dry band or reefer trailer safely.

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Keith Wertz: So, what we just discussed were injuries from 1,300 very different trucking companies.

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Keith Wertz: Many of the trucking companies in that study are like your company in some respects, but none of them is exactly like your company.

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Keith Wertz: so, I hope that the things that we talked about so far gave you some insight. However, it’s important that you conduct your own analysis to help you identify things to address

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Keith Wertz: in your company. Specifically.

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Keith Wertz: After all.

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Keith Wertz: unless there’s been some dramatic change. Your past employee injuries are the best indicator of what your future employees are going to be.

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Keith Wertz: So, in conducting your own analysis, there’s a number of different sources of information that you should gather. Of course, one of those things is your workers. Comp loss runs, and any supporting documents that you have on file for those workers. Comp claims

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Keith Wertz: that would include things like the State. 1st report of injury, form, or any internal incident form that you have

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Keith Wertz: another source of information that you could gather to do. Your analysis is your Osha. 300 logs.

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Keith Wertz: A lot of the entries on that form are going to be the same as on your workers. Comp. Loss runs. But it’s possible that there could be some entries on your Osha log that are not workers. Comp claims.

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Keith Wertz: You could also pull any near miss reports or incident reports that that neither rose to the level of an Osha recordable injury or a worker’s comp claim.

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Keith Wertz: So, I won’t read through these. But this slide shows some of the things that would be helpful to include when you’re analyzing incidents from

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Keith Wertz: for trends.

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Steve Kessler: And I think, you know, if you analyze the data that’s going to give you a good indication of where

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Steve Kessler: training needs to occur; it’s going to make sure that you’re focusing training that’s going to provide the benefit that you’re looking for.

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Keith Wertz: Absolute.

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Steve Kessler: Trained to tick a box, so to speak, so.

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Keith Wertz: Absolutely. So that I mean that that is the whole goal of this, of conducting your own analysis is to identify

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Keith Wertz: what, where to focus your efforts.

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Steve Kessler: Exactly, exactly.

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Keith Wertz: So

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Keith Wertz: although it’s important to analyze your own company’s data, it’s also important to consider the quality of the data that you’re using.

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Keith Wertz: I included a quote

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Keith Wertz: here. That kind of sums it up. It says good data leads to good decisions.

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Keith Wertz: So in terms of incident data, what makes good data.

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Keith Wertz: First, set it needs to be comprehensive. You need to have a process for capturing data from all incidents, whether they resulted in an injury or not

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Keith Wertz: so. If you don’t have a process for employees reporting near-miss events, it’d be a good idea to implement that.

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Keith Wertz: And if you have a process, but it’s not resulting in any reports

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Keith Wertz: you may need to dig in and understand why that is

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Keith Wertz: second for data to be good, it also needs to be thorough.

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Keith Wertz: So you’ll want to identify what data will be helpful.

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Keith Wertz: and you’ll want to make sure that your forms solicit that information

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Keith Wertz: our team has met with a lot of trucking companies that that document incidents using the State mandated 1st report of injury form, and they have no other internal way that they document incidents that’s their only form that they use.

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Keith Wertz: There’s a couple problems with that.

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Keith Wertz: First.st If the State reporting form is the sole form of internal documentation. I guarantee you those trucking companies aren’t documenting any incidents unless they rise to the level of a workers. Comp claim

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Keith Wertz: also, if a company is only using the State required 1st report of injury form. They’re failing to capture a lot of meaningful information.

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Keith Wertz: There’s so much more meaningful information that trucking companies need to gather about each incident that that you’re just not going to find anywhere on the State required 1st report of injury form.

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Keith Wertz: Now these include things like what at risk, conditions existed relative to the equipment or the environment at the time of the injury, or what? At risk behavior, the employee was engaged in that contributed to the incident.

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Keith Wertz: So yes, you, you need to solicit thorough information.

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Keith Wertz: But for that data to be thorough, it also means that you hold your people accountable

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Keith Wertz: for completing those fields consistently.

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Keith Wertz: Doesn’t make any doesn’t

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Keith Wertz: So, serve your purpose. If you have those fields on your internal form, and they’re not being filled out consistently.

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Keith Wertz: Which consistency is the next thing on the list here.

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Keith Wertz: When I’m mentioned that when I

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Keith Wertz: listed, the consistency here, what I was referring to is that it’s essential that you determine,

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Keith Wertz: what information that you want to collect about each incident and ensure that that’s done for every incident. Whether the incident resulted in a serious injury, a minor injury or no injury at all.

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Steve Kessler: Makes great sense. Because if you’re not consistent with the information you’re gathering.

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Steve Kessler: you’re not going to be able to make good decisions like your quote up there says. And

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Steve Kessler: it’s going to be just hit or miss. If you’re training in the right areas, just hitting, you know, doing

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Steve Kessler: gathering your data just periodically.

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Steve Kessler: is not going to give you a clear picture. In fact, it may give you a very skewed picture.

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Keith Wertz: Right.

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Steve Kessler: Of what’s happening there.

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Keith Wertz: Yeah.

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Keith Wertz: So, I want to shift gears here a little and talk about getting your employees engaged

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Keith Wertz: a lot of what I talked about so far has been focused on identifying areas to target like Steve mentioned. Although, that’s in

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Keith Wertz: important data is just data unless we’re using it for something.

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Keith Wertz: I think that is probably a natural tendency for many people in a safety management position to think that we have the answers because we have an education, or we have experience doing that.

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Keith Wertz: However, getting employees engaged in identifying solutions is important.

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Keith Wertz: They’re the ones engaged in the tasks. They’re the ones exposed to the hazards, and it’s their insights that they can often identify the best solutions

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Keith Wertz: they might identify that that we, in a safety management position might not have ever thought about so.

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Steve Kessler: Yeah, when you have engaged employees, you have a much better chance of

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Steve Kessler: creating that culture of safety within your company that a lot of people strive to.

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Steve Kessler: so, people are. If you engage with them, safety will be more top of mind. I would say most of the time.

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Keith Wertz: Absolutely involving employees and identifying solution.

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Keith Wertz: gives them that sense of ownership.

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Keith Wertz: and that that sense of ownership translates into employees internalizing those things, and ultimately leads to safer behavior and fewer injuries.

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Steve Kessler: There we go!

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Keith Wertz: And unfortunately, I think this is an area where a lot of trucking company safety directors could improve. So

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Keith Wertz: so, when considering what controls to implement it’s important to understand what you see on this slide.

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Keith Wertz: for any injury exposure that that you want to control.

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Keith Wertz: We should start at the top of this list and work our way down. And that’s because the things at the top of this list are the most effective strategies, and as we work our way down through this list, they become increasingly less effective.

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Keith Wertz: They don’t.

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Keith Wertz: At the top of this graphic is elimination. So elimination refers to removing exposure.

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Keith Wertz: for example, making the decision to only transport freight, that is, driver. No touch eliminates the exposure to drivers handling freight

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Keith Wertz: substitution refers to replacing a material or a process with a less hazardous one.

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Keith Wertz: For example, a flatbed hauler could substitute a conventional lever type chain binder with a ratchet type chain binder, which is a safer alternative.

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Keith Wertz: Oh.

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Keith Wertz: engineering controls is the next one that refers to things that we can do to prevent hazards from reaching employees. So, one example of this for the trucking industry is to provide mechanics with a tire inflation cage.

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Keith Wertz: No administrative controls towards the bottom. There refers to providing employees with training procedures or warnings. So, this includes any safety training that you do, or even things like putting fall hazard stickers on truck cabs.

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Keith Wertz: and then down at the very bottom is PPE. PPE, as you know, refers to things that are worn to protect workers. So, one example of that might be requiring employees to wear bump caps when they’re throwing load security straps.

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Keith Wertz: No, before we jump off this slide I wanted to make a couple of points. So

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Keith Wertz: first, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with using a combination of these to control a hazard second.

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Keith Wertz: Sometimes the solutions that we come up with

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Keith Wertz: could introduce new hazards, and we need to be careful not to do that.

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Keith Wertz: And lastly, sometimes it. It takes a while to implement long term solutions, and in those circumstances, we need to consider some interim controls that that we can implement quicker.

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Steve Kessler: Very good. That’s good advice.

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Keith Wertz: So, lastly, I wanted to talk very briefly and very broadly about experience rating and the impact that it can have in the context of workers. Compensation and insurance experience rating is the process of comparing your company’s claims. History with the average workers. Comp claims history for your industry in your State

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Keith Wertz: Although the actual calculations used by the National Council on compensation, insurance or state rating bureaus is much more complicated. It’s essentially actual losses divided by expected losses over a 3 year period.

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Keith Wertz: So, in that formula, actual losses are the incurred losses from your company’s claims over that period.

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Keith Wertz: and the expected losses are the amount that your company was expected to have

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Keith Wertz: based on all the other companies in your state, in your industry.

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Keith Wertz: Now, admittedly, that is, that is very much an oversimplification.

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Keith Wertz: but at least provides an understanding of what the experience rating process is.

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Keith Wertz: what the experience rating process produces is the experience modification factor which goes by several different names X, MoD, experience, MoD, or just MoD

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Keith Wertz: emf, so goes by several names. But

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Keith Wertz: in a nutshell, if you have an experience, MoD of 1.0,

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Keith Wertz: that means that your workers comp claims history is average for your industry.

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Keith Wertz: If you have an experience, MoD. Less than one. That means that your claims history is better than average for your industry.

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Keith Wertz: and if your company has an experienced, my greater than 1.0. That means that your claims history is worse than average for your industry.

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Keith Wertz: The important thing to remember is that the experience modification factor is used as a multiplier when calculating your workers comp premiums. So that means if

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Keith Wertz: a company has an experience modification rating of 1.5

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Keith Wertz: that’ll bump their workers comp premiums up by 50%.

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Keith Wertz: If they’re unfortunate enough to have an experience modification factor of 2.0. That’ll double their premium.

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Keith Wertz: But the reverse is true as well. I mean, if a company’s experience modification factor is 0 point 7 5, that’ll reduce their premium by 25%.

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Keith Wertz: So, a couple very general things to remember about the experience writing process.

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Keith Wertz: First, it’s calculated, based on a 3 year period, which means that one bad year with respect to workers, Comp claims is going to have less of a negative impact.

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Keith Wertz: It also means that one good year is, is not going to give you a favorable experience modification factor.

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Keith Wertz: Oh.

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Steve Kessler: Works both ways.

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Keith Wertz: Second, the calculation caps large claims. For example, if large claims in your State are capped at $100,000 and a worker, compensation claim exceeds $100,000, the amount in excess of that cap is either not factored into the calculation at all, or significantly discounted in the calculation.

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Keith Wertz: So that means that having one very large claim is not likely going to make your experience modification factor, Skyrocket.

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Keith Wertz: And next, I want to talk about lost time. Claims lost time. Claims are weighted more heavily

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Keith Wertz: in the calculation than our medical only claims.

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Keith Wertz: With that in mind.

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Keith Wertz: That’s 1 reason to explore the feasibility of modified duty. Return to work, if it’s at all possible to bring your employees back to work as long as that can be done within the physical restrictions imposed by the treating physician.

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Keith Wertz: you know, brilliant.

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Keith Wertz: One distinction to make here is that a lost time. Injury in the context of experience rating. It

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Keith Wertz: is an employee who misses work due to the injury that results in wage replacement benefits

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Keith Wertz: in many States wage replacement benefits don’t kick in until the you know, anywhere. Between 3 and 7 days after the after the injury of the employee being off so getting the employee back in that time in that window

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Keith Wertz: can keep a claim from being considered a lost time claim, as it relates to experience rating.

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Keith Wertz: Nope.

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Keith Wertz: if you don’t know your company’s experience modification factor find out what it is. If you have an experience modification factor significantly. Less than 1.0.

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Keith Wertz: You’ve had a relatively prolonged history of workers, Comp claims that are more favorable than what you were expected to have congratulations, keep up the good work.

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Steve Kessler: There you go!

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Keith Wertz: God.

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Keith Wertz: if your experience modification factor is significantly above 1.0 you’ve got some work to do to drive that down. And it’s not going to happen overnight.

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Keith Wertz: So in terms of workers, compensation, trucking is considered a severity driven industry.

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Keith Wertz: An individual trucking company may have relatively few claims, but the potential for a severe worker’s comp claim is greater than it is in many other industries. So that said, you may have very few incidents to create your own

406
00:57:32.400 –> 00:57:34.080
Keith Wertz: claims. Analysis.

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Keith Wertz: if that’s the case, I hope that the information from the study that we did was helpful in identifying some of the key sources of workers. Comp claims in the trucking industry.

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Keith Wertz: Oh.

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Keith Wertz: but regardless of the size of your company, or the number of workers comp plans that you’ve had in recent years. I’d encourage you to take a good hard look at your process for collecting data.

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Keith Wertz: I’d encourage you to implement a near miss reporting process if you don’t have one.

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Keith Wertz: and to analyze your own company’s incident data to identify areas that that you should target.

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Keith Wertz: I’d also encourage you to take an honest look at your process for engaging employees in the process of identifying hazard controls and then implement those controls based on that hierarchy of controls.

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Keith Wertz: Graphic that we looked at earlier.

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Keith Wertz: Yeah.

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Keith Wertz: Lastly, I’d like you to. I’d like to encourage you to look at your experience modification factor, understand? What got you where you are and what you can do to drive that number down.

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Keith Wertz: you know.

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Keith Wertz: Thank you very much. In

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Steve Kessler: That’s fantastic, Keith.

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Steve Kessler: That’s some outstanding information, a whole lot of things that I was not aware of. So, I really appreciate the information you provided in the study that you all have

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Steve Kessler: have, you know, completed to share this with us. There is one question here from Kevin, and I think maybe you might have sort of touched on it there at the end.

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Steve Kessler: He’s asking, at what level do you determine? A minor or major incident is that from dollar amount or

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Keith Wertz: Yeah, so, so.

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Steve Kessler: That’s judged.

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Keith Wertz: I guess that would all depend on the individual company; I mean for calculation of the experience. MoD, that is, that’s determined at this at the State level. I think most States are around that $100,000 mark

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Keith Wertz: for a for what? Severe but I mean it.

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Keith Wertz: The average cost of a of a

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Keith Wertz: workers Comp plan I had mentioned earlier, I think, was $34,000. So

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Keith Wertz: apart from the ones that are motor vehicle crashes. So, anything higher than that would be above average. And

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Keith Wertz: you could internally determine that to be you know a major incident.

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Steve Kessler: Okay.

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Steve Kessler: one question that that I had, and then you sort of addressed it early in your presentation there are obviously indirect costs associated with work comp injuries, and I have understood that often those indirect costs can be more than what the insurance is obligated to pay for. I was wondering if you could expand on that just a little bit.

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Keith Wertz: Yeah. So, the Federal Osha website has a calculator that they call safety pays

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Keith Wertz: so, employers could go in there and

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Keith Wertz: determine in broad terms what the

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Keith Wertz: the ultimate cost of an injury is like I mentioned earlier. When we’re looking at a at an injury the cost of the claim is what

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01:01:25.260 –> 01:01:28.300
Keith Wertz: is the cost of the claim for us. So

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Keith Wertz: there, there’s quite a few of different factors that

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Keith Wertz: that would need to be considered when calculating the ultimate cost of the claim, so that that safety pays calculator might be helpful in that regard.

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Steve Kessler: That’s great.

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Steve Kessler: Keith. One last thing quickly. I read recently that there are more injuries for new employees. They have more accidents in the 1st 12 months of employment than more sustained employees or long term. Is that information you’re aware of? Or is that typical? Or is that an outlier

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Steve Kessler: article.

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Keith Wertz: So that is, that is typically true, for any industry and trucking is no exception.

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Keith Wertz: Another thing that I I did not.

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Keith Wertz: Pulled into the presentation is.

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Keith Wertz: the cost of the claim is generally higher.

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Keith Wertz: as the as the employee increases in age and that is oh.

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Keith Wertz: likely due to comorbidities and the just the fact that the older we are the

448
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Keith Wertz: the longer it takes to heal.

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Steve Kessler: Makes perfect sense, Keith. I think we’ve kind of run through our hour here today.

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01:03:01.490 –> 01:03:19.899
Steve Kessler: but special thanks to you for joining us. This is great information. And I think we’d really like to make sure we kind of update this from time to time. So, look back on a program like this in the future. Certainly, if anything else pops up.

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01:03:20.060 –> 01:03:25.030
Steve Kessler: Mark, thank you for joining us today, and, thanks to all of you all out there

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01:03:25.270 –> 01:03:37.519
Steve Kessler: that sat in on our webinar today, Keith. I don’t know if you can see the chat, but there are all kinds of thank your popping in, and I’ll send you the list, so you can see who always out there, and

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01:03:37.550 –> 01:03:48.550
Steve Kessler: but tremendous information. And I think it’s something we all just need to think about, and one of the things that just popped into my head. You know, the trucking industry has been a little tough

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01:03:49.085 –> 01:04:05.660
Steve Kessler: lately, and profitability has been an issue. And you know, when you’re thinking about insurance and ways, you can reduce claims, and the costs associated with them can add money to the bottom line of the company so safety can impact profitability significantly.

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Keith Wertz: Absolutely.

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Steve Kessler: Very good, Keith.

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01:04:08.730 –> 01:04:09.940
Steve Kessler: Yes, and sure.

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Mark Rhea: 4 out of 5 of those injuries are not crash related.

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Steve Kessler: Yeah.

460
01:04:15.510 –> 01:04:15.870
Keith Wertz: Right.

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01:04:15.870 –> 01:04:17.859
Steve Kessler: Very true, have you?

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01:04:17.860 –> 01:04:26.939
Steve Kessler: Thank you, sir, thanks to everybody that joined us, and I look forward to getting an invite on our next Webinar. Keith. Thank you, sir. Appreciate your time today.

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01:04:27.460 –> 01:04:28.109
Keith Wertz: Thank you.

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Mark Rhea: Thank you, Keith.

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Steve Kessler: Thanks. Everyone.