Wood Gutmann & Bogart Insurance Brokers is proud to announce that Lupe Erwin, Executive Vice President of our Private Client Services division has been nominated by the Orange County Business Journal as one of the Top Businesswomen in Orange County.  The 2019 Women in Business Awards program allows for the recognition of five exceptional businesswomen in Orange County. Five awards will be presented at the 2019 Women in Business Awards Luncheon & Program on May 8, 2019 at the Hotel Irvine.

2019 Changes to your X-MOD Calculations

1. Your final X-MOD calculation has been simplified to:
   (Actual Primary Losses + Expected Excess Losses) / Expected Losses
2. The approved 2019 eligibility threshold to qualify for an experience modification is $10,000.
3. The WCIRB has an online Experience Modification Estimator (download shortcut sheet). This is in the form of an Excel spreadsheet.
4. To address the under reporting of “first aid” incidents, the first $250 of each loss is excluded from the formula. However you must still enter claims less than $250 even though they will be excluded from the calculation.
5. Grouping of small claims under $2,001 in a single policy period has been eliminated. This will have a huge impact on past data for 2015, 2016 and 2017. You will need to go back and re-enter the claim data for these years. This might be a lot of work for some of you.

2019 Changes to Injury & Illness Reporting

1. You must inform each employee how to report a work related injury and make your injury and illness records available to your employees and their representatives.
2. When an employee, former employee, personal representative, or authorized employee representative asks for copies of your current or stored Cal/OSHA 300 forms or a current or stored annual summary for an establishment the employee or former employee has worked in, you must give the requester a copy of the relevant Cal/OSHA 300 forms and annual summaries by the end of the next business day. Exception: If your establishment is in NAICS Code 5121, you must give the requester the information within seven (7) calendar days.
3. Leave the names on the Cal/OSHA 300 forms unless the employee independently and voluntarily requests that his or her name not be entered on the log or if there is a privacy concern as outlined in §14300.29 (7)(A-F).
4. When an authorized employee representative asks for copies of the Cal/OSHA 301 Incident Reports or equivalent forms for an establishment where the agent represents employees under a collective bargaining agreement, you must give copies of those forms to the authorized employee representative within seven (7) calendar days but with the following personally identifying information deleted:
   name; address; date of birth; date of hire; gender; name of physician; location where treatment was provided; whether the employee was treated in an emergency room; and whether the employee was hospitalized overnight as an in-patient.
5. For both the Cal/OSHA 300 and Cal/OSHA 301 forms, you must keep a separate, confidential list of the case numbers and employee names for your privacy concern cases so you can update the cases and provide the information to the government if asked to do so.

2019 “Takin’ Care of Business” Check List

• W9s on file for all contractors
• Any adjustments to the 940/941s filed during the year
• Make sure the employee list is up-to-date
• File W2s by January 31, 2018
• 1099-MISC, 1099-S, 1099-B by February 15, 2019
• Check payroll rates/payroll reflects the most current unemployment rate;
  pay complies with current OT and minimum wage law.
• Update any changed policies and procedures
• Update service account passwords and who has access to them
• Download all online transactions (PayPal, Square, etc; bank statements, online purchases, utilities)
• Back-up all 2018 electronic records
• Check inventory
• Re-evaluate your assets, liabilities and insurance needs
• Set Goals for the year
• What needs improvement?
• What business activities need to be eliminated?
• What would you like to achieve?

Final Thoughts

Should you find the Experience Modification Estimator daunting or you just don’t want to take the time to do it yourself, our team will be happy to provide an estimate for you. As part of your business planning for 2019, we can review your insurance coverages to make sure your risks and costs are minimized.

We are very pleased to announce that Gore Lieske & Associates Insurance Brokers has opened a new office location in Lehi, Utah!  

The advancement of information technology has made it easier than ever to run a small business, but your organization as well as your customers and their data may be at risk unless proper cybersecurity measures are in place.

Wood Gutmann & Bogart Insurance Brokers Welcomes Arnie Taylor

Wood Gutmann & Bogart is pleased to announce that Arnie Taylor has joined our team of professionals. Arnie brings several years of knowledge and experience to his role as Risk Advisor in the Private Client Services division.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has added a new statement to its website to communicate that they are not accepting electronic submissions of 300 logs at this time, and intends to propose extending the July 1, 2017 deadline.

Recent incidents of terrorism shine a spotlight on risks faced by publicly accessible locations. Businesses in highly populated metro areas are vulnerable to political violence, but may not have a security presence in place. Types of properties at risk are accessible to the masses, such as:

Various types of injuries can occur while playing sports, such as strained muscles or ligaments, but many of the most serious injuries are eye-related.

An active shooter is an individual actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area. To best prepare your staff for an active shooter situation, create an emergency action plan (EAP) and conduct training exercises. Together, the EAP and training exercises will prepare your staff to effectively respond and help minimize loss of life.