Massachusetts Workers' Compensation

Workers' compensation is a commercial insurance product categorized as Property & Casualty insurance (P&C Insurance). Even though workers comp is calculated using estimated payroll wages and class codes, premium is still a separate business expense from the cost of payroll. Business owners may treat the cost of coverage as an expense on their taxes.

Work comp rates for all job classification codes are always expressed as a percentage of $100 in wages. An annual policy is always subject to an audit because it was based on estimated wages and not actual wages.

Here is an example using two class codes with different estimated payroll for each class code:

In order to calculate the cost of the policy you only need to multiply each rate with its divided payroll. It benefits employers to re-calculate their premium as their payroll becomes larger than originally anticipated.

Every state has their own rules for how employees must be covered and how they must be classified for rating premium. A lot of states use state specific class codes and have different requirements for who is obligated to carry workers' compensation insurance coverage.

If you have employees that travel out of state for work, or they work in multiple states throughout the year, you may need to purchase insurance for all the states where your workers are located and working. In most cases, you can add multiple states to one policy.

Workers' Compensation Insurance in Massachusetts can be purchased from private insurance companies authorized by the state to provide coverage. The Assigned Risk Pool, or State Insurance Fund, is available for employers who are unable to find coverage from a private company. WorkersCompensationShop.com can help you navigate your best options.

Policy premium is based on numerous factors including: class codes assigned to your business and employees, estimated payroll, covered states, prior policies, owner experience and previous insurance claims.