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Chalking up the wins for you and us...
Time to celebrate another win for the customer – this one is claims related. Sit tight and hold on while I take you on the wild ride that is ACC.
This is a sad story of an employee injured on the job who was off work for a significant period of time due to an underlying health condition. The employee had made all attempts to return to work, but in the end was just too sick.
ACC applied their usual process of attributing costs for the workplace injury to the employer – fair enough, no issues there. But they continued to apply costs to the employer for the extended time-off the employee had for an issue they had no control or influence over – that being his personal health issues.
We took ACC to dispute over this – the whole thing being complicated by the worker having since passed away from the other issues. In cases like these, the reviewer needs to decide whether the estate of the deceased should be at any hearing, as “all persons who would be entitled to be present and heard at the hearing” are allowed to participate (or not if they choose) in the hearing. Essentially this means anyone who may be affected by the decision can be there.
Sometimes, we need to nudge ACC to make a decision that is not in the legislation – one that involves compassion over income – so we suggested a compromise. The employer keeps the workplace claim, but the costs relating to the health issue are moved elsewhere.
ACC agreed to the compromise.
Due to the agreement, the employer was sitting on a 10% Experience Rating loading – they’ve just been moved to a 10% discount, giving them back over $11,000 in credits.
A compromise doesn’t mean we’re backing down from a challenge – it means we’re strong enough to do the right thing.
Always in integrity – the Jack Russell’s of the ACC world.
