Delaware Commissioner Orders Comp Cost Cut

Delaware Insurance Commissioner Matt Denn is ordering an 11.57 percent across-the-board cut in average workers' compensation premium rates effective Oct. 1, 2008, and that he will consider making additional reductions within the next 60 days.

Combined with a package of 17.75 – 22 percent rate cuts Denn ordered last fall, this reduction will mean average Delaware workers' comp rates have been cut by approximately 30 percent since last November.

The workers' comp rate cuts announced Tuesday are the first resulting from workers' compensation cost control measures passed by the General Assembly in 2008, Denn said.

But, in the order to insurance companies, Denn warned that the workers' comp insurance companies have “not made sufficient efforts to determine the potential cost savings to carriers of all of the provisions of Senate Bill 1,” and told the carriers and Department of Insurance staff to provide him with information to consider additional reductions.

“I intend to ensure to the maximum degree permitted by law that any likely cost savings resulting from Senate Bill 1 are reflected in lower premiums rather than being retained as windfall gains by insurance carriers,” Denn said in his order.

With total workers' comp premiums paid by Delaware employers estimated at $122 million a year, the rate cuts ordered by Denn should mean savings of at least $14 million to Delaware businesses.

These actions are on an application by the Delaware Compensation Ratings Bureau, which submits requests for the “loss cost” calculations upon which all workers' comp insurance companies base their rates.