ADJUSTED
ADJUSTED
Beyond Coverage: How Berkley Industrial Comp Delivers More For Our Insureds
In this special edition of Adjusted, the podcast joins the conversation of a recent Webinar that Berkley Industrial Comp shared with their insureds and agents-Beyond Coverage: How Berkley Industrial Comp Delivers More For Our Insureds.
When workplace accidents happen in high-hazard industries, having the right workers' compensation partner can make all the difference. Berkeley Industrial Comp stands apart through their focus on expertise, service, and innovative approaches tailored specifically for businesses facing significant workplace risks.
What truly differentiates Berkeley Industrial Comp? It starts with their claims team, where adjusters maintain substantially lower caseloads than industry standards and average 15 years of experience. This expertise translates into proactive claims handling and creative solutions that optimize outcomes while staying within statutory guidelines. Their empathetic resolution model puts injured workers first, recognizing that caring about people leads to better results and lower costs for everyone involved.
The risk management team brings nearly a century of combined field experience from the very industries they serve. Unlike checkbox-focused inspections, Berkeley's safety consultants understand your operations because they've worn the boots and done the work themselves. This yields practical, achievable safety recommendations that actually reduce claims - as evidenced by clients who've seen 40% reductions in frequency and dramatic improvements in experience modification ratings.
Perhaps most uniquely, Berkeley's Business Engagement Unit eliminates the frustration of being transferred between departments or waiting for return calls. Their team answers live and is trained across multiple specialties to resolve issues on the first contact. The MedCall service provides 24/7 access to emergency room physicians with occupational medicine experience, ensuring injured workers receive appropriate care while creating documentation that protects all parties.
The results speak for themselves - from helping amputees return to heavy equipment operation through innovative prosthetics to engineering solutions that eliminate repetitive motion injuries. Berkeley Industrial Comp delivers on their promise to do right, think differently, and never forget to care about the people they serve.
Want to experience the difference? Reach out today to learn how Berkeley can customize their services to your unique needs and help you create a safer, more productive workplace with lower insurance costs over time.
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Season 9 is brought to you by Berkley Industrial Comp. This episode is hosted by Greg Hamlin.
Visit the Berkley Industrial Comp blog for more!
Got questions? Send them to marketing@berkleyindustrial.com
For music inquiries, contact Cameron Runyan at camrunyan9@gmail.com
Hello everybody and welcome to Adjusted. I'm your host, greg Hamlin, coming at you from beautiful Birmingham, Alabama, and I'm excited to share with you today this special episode of Adjusted. We recently had a webinar for Berkeley Industrial Comp where we showcased how our organization is different and what we offer our policyholders, and it was a pretty amazing conversation where we really showcased some of the things that we do different that really differentiate Berkeley Industrial Comp from some of the other carriers that are out there in the marketplace. And so I'm excited to share this special episode with you and hope you learn a little bit more about what we do here at Berkeley Industrial Comp, and I remind you always to do right, think differently and don't forget to care. Enjoy. Thank you again for joining us. We're glad you're here.
Speaker 1:My name is Greg Hamlin, I am the Chief Claims Officer for Berkeley Industrial Comp and we're going to be today presenting a webinar on, beyond coverage, how Berkeley Industrial Comp delivers more for our insurers. And first, before I even get too far into introducing our expert panel, I just want to let you guys know I've been with Berkeley Industrial Comp now for nearly seven years and it really this is a special organization that really provides some services that are outside the box and I know everybody feels like they're the best at what they do. But I'm really proud of the team that I'm part of and I think today you're going to learn some of the things that make us special. So we're going to hear from our expert panel, who represent different parts of our operations and what we offer to our insureds. I always say, hopefully you never need us because everything goes smoothly, but in reality, we know that accidents happen and when they happen we're here for you and we reality. We know that accidents happen and when they happen we're here for you and we want to make sure that that's a seamless process. So I'd like to go through and introduce our expert panel so you can get to know them.
Speaker 1:I've already told you a little bit about myself. I'm the Chief Claims Officer for Berkeley Industrial Comp. I've been in the industry 20 plus years and my claim to fame is I'm an Indiana Hoosier and I'm crazy and have six kids. So if you ever want to know what that's like, feel free to ping me outside of here and I can tell you what it's like to have a three year old and a 20 year old at the same time and everything in between. So that's me. Next up we have my good friend Luella Alcorn. Luella and I go back. We've worked across several companies together and she is amazing. I'm going to let her tell you a little bit about herself and what she does here at Berkeley Industrial.
Speaker 2:Hi, I am the Senior Business Operations Manager. We have an office in Lexington, kentucky, and that's where I sit. It is beautiful in Kentucky. Fun fact about me is I am nine of 13 children. I'm born and raised in St Louis and that's where I attribute a lot of my hard work. That I learned it's from growing up and being a hard worker nine of 13.
Speaker 1:Nice to be here. See, you have to show me up. I say I have six kids. She goes. I'm nine of 13. You see how this goes. But though, luella is amazing. We're going to learn a lot from her. I'm really glad to have her as part of my team and she adds a lot to Berkeley Industrial. Next up, my good friend Chris Drake and Chris and I have the opportunity to work together on the claim side, and we also have worked across a couple of different companies together, and so, chris, I will let you introduce yourself and put in a few good words for our Hoosiers.
Speaker 3:Yeah, absolutely. First things first. We probably need to change my picture. I look like I ate myself there. But, chris Drake, I am a claims manager. I've been in the work comp industry about 17 years. I work remotely from the Indianapolis area. I am a Pacers fan. I am actually past the morning phase at this point. I've been able to accept that I'm moving on to the Colts. But I'm like Greg who, I think low-key, probably still cries himself to sleep in the Pacers. I'm hurting.
Speaker 3:I'm looking forward to the Colts coming up in August and September, but I'm not that optimistic with our quarterback situation. But I'm a glass half-full guy, so I'm not that optimistic with our quarterback situation, but I'm a glass half full guy, so I'm channeling those vibes. If you're Colts fans, let's get on this train. We're going to have a good season. But looking forward to talking to all you guys today.
Speaker 1:Thanks, chris. Chris is definitely an expert in the claims field, so we'll be learning a lot more about what he does and what we do on the claims side from Chris. Finally, I want to tell you about my good friend, duane hathaway, who also is in kentucky, as mentioned earlier as people were logging in. My favorite thing fun fact about duane is when he meets with our insurers he always says we get in where we fit in, and so I had to get that out there before he does, because that's my favorite saying he's with our safety safety team. So, dwayne, I'll let you take it from here and tell us a little bit about you.
Speaker 4:Yeah, thanks, greg. I'll talk more about where we fit in a little bit later in the webinar. But I too have several kids, not six, not 13, but I have four and they range from one to 12, so quite a gap there. If Greg doesn't have the answers, maybe I do, so feel free to ping me as well. We stay busy fishing and playing games. And, funny fact, yesterday I went fishing with my son and caught a nice bass, probably four pounds, and I picked it up to show him and as I was leaning over the edge of the kayak it completely flipped over on me and I lost my breath because I wasn't expecting it. But I made it back up, flipped it, brought it to the shore and unloaded. That water mitigated that risk. And we'll talk a little bit more about the services we have shortly that can help you mitigate some of your exposure in the realm of workers' comp. But that's a little bit about me and my family. Thanks for asking, greg.
Speaker 1:Thanks, dwayne, we're glad to have you. Dwayne's definitely an expert and we're lucky to have him. So, as we go a little bit further, we're going to dive a little deeper into each of the areas that we offer services we offer to our policyholders and so we're going to talk through those different areas and then at the end we'll have a little Q&A. So we're going to start with our next slide, which should be delivering more from claims. So I'm a claims guy. I started my career in claims 20 years ago at the same place that Chris did. We learned a lot about workers' compensation and we've taken what we've learned in the industry and really innovated upon it here at Berkeley Industrial Comp. So I want Chris first just to talk a little bit about what makes Berkeley Industrial claims different.
Speaker 3:Absolutely, and I got put on a clock here so I'll try to make it as brief as possible. But if you look specifically at what we do and what our appetite is, our exposure is high severity, low frequency. As a result, the margin of error is significantly smaller. Every claim, not every injury is going to be the same. Each one of them is going to present with their own set of challenges. So we acknowledge that every injured worker, insured has varying degrees of experience and knowledge of workers' compensation. You're going to have some injured workers that may never have had a claim before, and then you're going to have those unlucky few that literally need to go into work every day and bubble wrap right. So we're going to have some insureds that just don't know a lot about workers' compensation and others that have more sophisticated risk programs. It doesn't matter Wherever you are. We're going to meet you where you are and we're going to shepherd you through this claims process. We tailor our program based on each individual insured's needs, and then what we do is we leverage our adjuster's technical expertise, as well as the vendor partners that we work with, to optimize some of the outcomes. So, greg, to get to your point, how do we accomplish this? What is the bigger differentiators from the customer standpoint? First and foremost, I would say that we have significantly lower caseloads in the industry average. That is by design. We do it because of the level of claims that we're going to handle. But secondly, it allows the adjusters the opportunity to give the individual interworkers the attention that they need. We can also focus on the proactive claims handling. We provide the adjusters with the autonomy to handle the claims, to make the decisions, and then we empower them to use creative thinking to be able to find solutions. So if you think about how workers' compensation works, the statute really is the framework for administering the benefits, but what we want to do is we want to explore the creative solutions within the confines of the statute to help optimize these outcomes. So not only are we tailoring our programs to the insureds, let's put that onto the injured workers as well. Each one of them is going to have their own specific case facts and then we're going to be able to pivot as the case facts change throughout the life of the claim.
Speaker 3:To put this into a practical example, if you think about an injured worker, they're given light duty restrictions and then there has to be a decision made at that point by the insured Are you going to be able to accommodate these restrictions or not? If they're not able to accommodate those, we're going to stop them right there and we want to be able to address that situation versus revisiting it again at the next office visit. Why that matters. Every day of lost time is just going to add to the total incurred on the file, which is going to impact their mod down the road. Secondly, you have to take the injured worker into consideration. They're probably on lost time benefits which aren't going to equate to what they would normally make with their regular wages.
Speaker 3:So, with that being said, we're going to have those discussions with the insured. We want to know okay, what is it that you can accommodate? Let's take that, let's frame that, take it back to the doctor and then try to negotiate a different release so that we can accommodate those restrictions. If that still doesn't work, we have the opportunity to leverage some of our external partners. We use re-employability a lot. They're an amazing company. They help us with continuing to place an injured worker into temporary transitional employment. That will bridge the gap from that light duty to where they need to get, to the full duty release. So really, from that standpoint, it comes down to identifying the needs of the insureds, developing the solutions that will help to optimize the overall outcome of that specific claim but then also to mitigate on the future claims.
Speaker 1:Oh, I was just going to say I love that, chris. I feel like when you look at Berkeley Industrial Comp, this outside-the-box thinking comes from the fact that our average adjuster has 15 years of experience. That's a lot of industry experience and it allows us to give them a lot of autonomy and freedom that a lot of other carriers wouldn't give their staff with those lower caseloads, so we can really drive outcomes. Chris, as you start to think through some of the other things that are special about us, talk a little bit about our jurisdictional expertise and what that looks like.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think what we try to do is we want to minimize the number of jurisdictions that each adjuster handles. That allows us to be experts in the field. We can leverage that jurisdictional expertise and we're spread across the country. We have adjusters in all the time zones that we ensure. We encourage our adjusters to attend seminars specific to the states that they handle, but then also pursue continuing education as well. That's going to help them to sharpen their ax and hone their crafts.
Speaker 3:And another thing, greg, just to kind of go back to your point, I want to hit on this with the 15 years of experience, that is significantly more than the industry average. And I think, if you think about what we do day in and day out, we are high severity right. We are equipped to be able to handle those claims as immediately when they come in the door we're going to be able to jump on them and deploy the resources. Why that matters is other people may not have that ability to jump right. Then it's a shock when they get a high severity or a severe case. The adjusters do this day in and day out. They're calm, they're collected under pressure. They know how to respond to those. And I think the other thing, too, is you have to take into consideration the consistency standpoint. Workers' compensation claims have a tail and it's rare in the industry I think we can all agree to that to have one adjuster handle a claim from cradle to grave. And if you put that in an inter-worker's perspective, that's going to be extremely frustrating to get bounced around and not have one consistent line of communication. They're going to get that in our model. They know that they can trust they're going to receive consistent service, payment of benefits and also allow them to focus solely on their recovery and nothing else. They also have that direct line of communication. So you're having injured workers, insureds, agents all have that direct line directly to the adjuster. They can pick up the phone, they can call them. They're going to get an adjuster on the line. Also, we have the ability to do texting. So I wanted to go back to that piece because I think that's something that we really want to showcase that the adjusters do differently.
Speaker 3:And I think the fourth thing that I would really try to hammer on outside of the jurisdictional expertise, greg, is the empathetic resolution model. I think this is probably by far the most near and dear to me and I think this is what is a real differentiator from what we do. If you think about an injured worker from their perspective, they're not going to get up that day or go into work thinking I'm going to get injured. This is an absolute disruption to their daily lives, their well-being and their possible financial stability. So we're going to take the perspective of trying to look at it from the injured worker's lens. How would we want a claim to be handled if it was us that was injured? And then we're going to try to replicate that on what we deliver for the injured workers and also the service for our insureds With our caseloads. It allows us to be able to give our undivided attention to the adjusters and then also the specific needs of the injured workers and then their employers. So some of the examples no, go ahead.
Speaker 1:Chris, I was just going to say I have a friend of mine in the industry that said you're the only company I know that sends cookies after a surgery to injured workers. And it really is true, because when we think about our injured workers, we care about them and we really believe that by caring about them and investing in their recovery, we're going to get a better outcome, we're going to avoid unnecessary litigation and we're going to gain cooperation, and cooperation gained between the two of us. That partnership is going to result in less spend and a better outcome. But, chris, your thoughts on that and another thing I wanted you to talk about is just what happens when we get a claim late versus when we get a claim reported on time. I know outcomes are important to us and we have those times where we get the claim a week, a month, sometimes three months late, and then we have the ones that we get within hours. What are some of the challenges in that?
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think. First, to go back to your first point, another thing too we do is we reroute the letters that we send in to workers, right? So that's going to alleviate some of the confusion with the letters. And then also we send out the wind chimes to people that lost loved ones as a result of a work-related fatality, and then also the handwritten notes. I don't know if you mentioned that, but we send out the handwritten notes to injured workers just to give that personal touch.
Speaker 3:But going back to the second part of that question, if you look at the late reporting they claim it's not only going to impact the overall treatment process. You have the impact on treatment overall, on lost time, and then you have the subrogation component. So the overall treatment we vet our providers. We have in-network providers that we can direct someone to. So when you're reporting the claim timely, it allows us to immediately jump in to get them into a provider that knows workers' compensation, that we can work through the occupational return to work process, but also that we know is extremely vetted. Then you have the light duty and the work status component that we can immediately start to work with the insurer to be able to coordinate or, if we need to initiate that transitional employment.
Speaker 3:And I think the third part of that too is your subrogation piece. It's all about preserving the evidence as well. So if anything could be discarded, destroyed, if you have a potential violation with a substance abuse or something like that, you're going to want to have that immediate talk screen. So any of that is negated if we don't have a claim reported timely, and then we're going to be chasing our tail. At that point in time we can get creative, but it's always better if the claim is reported immediately so that we can jump in.
Speaker 1:Great points, chris. Well, I appreciate everything Chris shared on claims. We're going to circle back in the Q&A and also talk a little bit about some case studies down the road. I want to switch gears here and talk a little bit about risk management. Dwayne, as I said your famous quote we get in where we fit in. So I know there are a lot of insurance companies that offer risk management programs. What separates us, dwayne, in your experience, from what some of our competition does?
Speaker 4:Yeah, thanks for the question. Really, the biggest differentiating factor is industry experience. Our team hasn't sat in insurance risk management roles their entire career, which is what you typically find with most other carriers. If you were to grab all the resumes and combine them, from our team you're going to see nearly 100 years of industry experience and then dozens of years of insurance experience. But when you combine them you get a really effective, high-impact risk management consultant, because we're able to put ourselves in the client's shoes when we're working with them. I'd say that's probably the biggest differentiator, because when we deliver these services, we're able to do it in the right mindset. We know what reasonable recommendations are. We know when we put something out there how achievable it is and by in doing so, we're able to find really effective programming outcomes for our clients when it comes to safety programs and loss control strategies.
Speaker 4:Now, a lot of our loss control services are centered around on-site visits, virtual visits. It's just going to depend on what the client's looking for and what type of internal resources they already have. And I'm getting to it, greg. I'm getting there because we get in where we fit in. We're dealing with a client that's got a full-time safety director and a few safety auditors and they've got a handle on things. We're going to provide service where they need it or where they ask for it, and that might be coming out once a year to do a program review with them or visit a specialty site that they've got going on. Conversely, we might have a smaller client that doesn't have a safety manager or safety director. You've got an HR manager that is also tasked with safety and they may lean on us a little harder and that may be a couple extra visits or virtual consultations or working with them remotely to develop a safety program.
Speaker 4:We have a lot of clients and I'm sure there's several on the webinar right now that deal with IS, networld and Nevada as part of the pre-qualification process for a lot of their larger clients, and we're able to help them deliver solutions for compliance in that realm, which they really appreciate. We also have a resource called the Risk Management Center that our clients have access to and we have access to to help deliver solutions. It's an online compliance platform targeted at small businesses with safety and HR-related solutions. It's got hundreds of videos, everything from housekeeping to fall protection or USDOT compliance, and the HR suite of resources has got state-specific solutions on drug screening and sexual harassment. So really, a comprehensive compliance platform, and we pay for that for our customers. They don't need to pay a dime. It's included in the premium that they pay to us. And, the way we see it, the better they do, the better we do. So we're happy to do this for our clients. We're happy to provide the resources and the expertise.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, dwayne, I've been out on a visit or two with you in the past and one of the things that impresses me with you, dwayne, and all your teammates, is just exactly what you said experience, that level of experience, dwayne. If I'm remembering right, you've got construction background prior to ever getting into claims, and we've got folks who've had mining experience, who've been underground, we've got safety people who have worked in these high hazard industries. So, rather than having somebody with a clipboard come in there with a check the box who doesn't truly understand the work that our insureds are doing, you guys have. Not only do you understand it, you've done it. Would you agree, dwayne?
Speaker 4:Absolutely. I'm glad you mentioned the checklist because I have been absolutely worn out by checklist carriers. They come in and we'll drag you around your premises checking boxes and they got to make sure they get them all done. Or the underwriting department's disappointed when they get back and it is a very dull process that doesn't deliver many results to the client. It may bring back the information that they need for underwriting, but the client isn't winning and we want the client to win because again I'll say it again the better they do, the better we do. So it's important that we deliver results that the client is able to do something with and mitigate their exposures and ultimately mitigate or minimize their experience modification rating so that they're paying less for insurance. They're having less losses. Everybody wins.
Speaker 1:Thanks, duane. I definitely appreciate your approach, and I want to switch gears again and this time, talk about another aspect of what we offer that is pretty important and something I'm actually really proud of, and that's our business engagement unit. This idea came out of probably a lot of thought that went in about four or five years ago of how the industry is changing, and one of the things that I feel strongly about, passionate about and I know Luella does so you're going to hear from her in just a minute is how important it is that we're available for the insureds and agents we serve. That communication is key. There is nothing more frustrating for me than being passed around like a Sunday plate and put on hold and transferred five times and then I still don't have an answer to the problem that I have, and so when we created the business engagement unit, we wanted to separate ourselves from the rest of the industry as someone who truly understands how to service our clients. So, lua, I'd love for you to talk about how that starts right at the onboarding phase.
Speaker 2:It's my favorite topic, as Greg mentioned. I am very passionate about it, and the actual name of our department says what we do. We engage with you and you can choose how you would like to engage with us. So I'd like to highlight a few things that I feel do set us apart from other carriers. Common times that you would have a question, whether you're an agent or a policyholder is onboarding, and that could be new policies, but it also could be a renewal policy. A payment plan could change, or you could add states or class codes and you might need some updated information. So our onboarding program is customized to you. We customize it to your payment plans, we customize it to the effective dates of your policy and we customize the information that you're going to need at new or renewal, to what we feel is important for you to know about. Additionally, at renewal is because sometimes the information has changed, so that's a very important time for us to make sure that you're aware of any changes that have been made to the last policy effective date and now.
Speaker 2:So then, in those emails, I want to make sure that you're understanding that we are offering multiple options on how do you wish to engage with the information that we provide you. Is the email sufficient and you read it and the email gives you all the information you need, and that's sufficient. Or there's a video that we've created. It's me on the video, and so do you want to digest the information via a video where we navigate our website and our portal? Or there is an option for you to click a link and schedule a meeting with me, and so if you prefer to have a meeting dedicated to me and you can invite whoever you'd wish to participate at your place of business, invite everyone, and we can do a customized meeting for you. The other thing that are go ahead.
Speaker 1:I was just going to say those kinds of meetings are were created for people like me who are a little technically challenged. The video is probably not going to work, but if I have 15 minutes with Luella, I'm good to go. I'll be ready to use our portal.
Speaker 2:Yep and again. So that is how are you a learner? And if it is a meeting, the beauty of that is then I can share my screen, you can share your screen right, and we can walk you through access to the portal, any of the questions that you have. So, again, those are all available to you. The other thing is like through the life of your policy, how we support you. There are multiple ways that you can engage with us there as well.
Speaker 2:We answer our phone calls live. My department has shifts that they take and we answer the phone calls live. The only reason why we wouldn't is if we're on the phone with another customer, feel comfortable in leaving a message and we will return your call as soon as possible. But we do that and we have training in all the different topics. So if you have a claims question, we're trained to answer those. If you have an underwriting question, we're trained to answer that. If you have a finance question, we're trained to answer those. So to Greg's point, we're not transferring you to three different people depending on what your questions are. That's taken a lot of time to get our employees trained, but we see the value in that where you can reach one person and get your questions answered there.
Speaker 2:Another thing that we support you with is in claim reporting. That's another time where you need us to be there for you. We have partnered with a vendor named MedCall, which is a Teladoc service, and that is a 24-7 available service to you. If you call MedCall on Christmas Day, they're going to answer the phone and they are not just intake of the claim. That sets up the claim for you. But then you can have your injured employee speak with an emergency room physician with occupational medicine experience, and that's really valuable. They're going to be talking and speaking to them and giving them recommendations based on their industry, their injury and directing them to the appropriate level of care for their injury. Do they need to be seen immediately? Can we schedule appointment and wait? But that's a cost savings to you and us making sure that they're going to the appropriate level of care.
Speaker 1:I was just going to add. Another piece of that med call that sometimes gets overlooked is those ER physicians. Those visits are recorded and we have access to those recordings later. So hopefully we live in a perfect world where no one's story would ever change. And they hurt their left elbow and their left elbow is the claim and the left elbow is everything. But we've seen body creep before, where something's a left elbow and now it's a right knee, and now it's a left shoulder, where something's a left elbow and now it's a right knee and now it's a left shoulder. And what's wonderful about MedCall is part of that service and we pay for that as a carrier. But part of that service is making sure we have that document where we can go back and listen to that recording should we need to, and that's really helped us in several different cases where there have been some questionable claims, several different cases where there have been some questionable claims.
Speaker 2:Yes, another item to a previous topic that you talked about with Chris is that details get fuzzy if you wait to report a claim. So that's another plug for timely reporting. And our supervisor's incident investigation report actually says report this in the shift. The incident occurs If you let that employee wait two or three days. It's not just the shoulder that hurts, now my neck hurts and my back hurts as well. So you want to report that injury as soon as possible. And then to Greg's point, then those calls are recorded as well.
Speaker 2:So, yes, the last thing I wanted to mention is just making sure that all of our customers, agents and policy holders would have access to our portal, and we have listened to the feedback from our customers, the items that they would like to see.
Speaker 2:They've given us enhancement suggestions and we've added additional information or details to our portal based on your feedback, so that the things that you want to have available to you are there for you. And the last thing I'll say about all of these items is this is all based on the contacts that we have for you at the policy level. So if we don't have the correct contacts, we could be sending these emails to the incorrect people. Or if the correct people don't have the correct contacts, we could be sending these emails to the incorrect people. Or if you don't have the correct people, don't have access to the portal, then we need to make sure that we're getting that. So please make sure that you're letting us know and anytime that someone comes on to your place of employment that you need us to have as far as a contact for your policy information. Please let us know to make sure that you're getting all the information that you need. Thanks, Greg.
Speaker 1:No, thank you, Luella. So I think one thing that resonated across all three of our experts that I think really sets us apart in the industry is expertise and service. And I think because we know that we write high hazard industries that where dangerous jobs require services like what we offer, we're prepared for it and we're not hope we. Well, I think some carriers write policies and hope there's never a claim. We know that there are going to be some losses and our goal is to make sure that we get the best possible outcome. That Dwayne's team sets it up from the front end and we've even done after action reviews when something has happened, where our safety team can come in and make some suggestions on what could be done in the future to improve safety, Because sometimes we're holding up that bass and the kayak flips over and we didn't see it coming and we can go back and do that after action review and say well, you know what, maybe we should have done something a little different to hold it up.
Speaker 1:How do we position ourselves to avoid that in the future when something does go wrong? So I want to move into the second part of this webinar, which is talking about some of the real success stories that we have. So I'm going to ask each of you start with Chris, and we'll kind of go around the horn and talk about an actual success story where what we've just talked about was live and in action. So, chris, we'll start with you from a claims perspective, share a success story.
Speaker 3:I'm going to preface this by saying this is a really complex situation so I'm going to do the best that I can to do this claim justice. But there's a plug because there is a podcast that Greg did on Adjusted with the adjuster, julie Greer, who's an amazing, catastrophic adjuster. So it's probably more entertaining than the murder mysteries or any crime types to podcasts you're going to listen to. So check it out. But anyway, the injured worker sustained a traumatic injury to the below the wrist or to the wrist ultimately resulted in the injured worker having an amputation below the elbow, treated at a known center of excellence, highly motivated to return to work as a heavy equipment operator. The problem was the prosthetic fittings were not resulting in the function that would allow the injured worker the flexibility to be able to go back and do that pre-injury work. Unfortunately, the provider wasn't able to provide the individual care that allowed that to become fully functioning. So what we did this is a perfect example of thinking on the fly, creative solutions. We were able to incur the extra cost of sending the interworker across the country to a prosthetic company which was run by somebody who happened to also suffer a traumatic amputation, as well as a number of the patient advocates on staff that were as well. So not only was it an environment that was created that was suited to dealing directly with the injured worker's needs. They truly understood what the injured worker was going to go through and what they needed to do to make that person the best version of themselves going forward. So they provided real-time simulation using heavy equipment through partnerships that they had with the local companies, and then the injured worker was able to use that new prosthetic on that equipment that they would have normally used, and then they were able to make the necessary adjustments and added attachments while the injured worker was on site.
Speaker 3:Ultimately, what ended up happening?
Speaker 3:You were staring down the barrel of someone never be able to go back to that capacity ever again, but he was able to obtain full functioning with that prosthetic to be able to go back to the pre-injury employment.
Speaker 3:So not only are they able to go back to work, but you think about it from the case value and how much this would cost. There was significant cost savings because of the cost of the prosthetic. Secondly, you're going to have costs over time that would continue to extrapolate and then you're going to have the onsite care and the fittings, but it ultimately led to the injured worker being able to get back to a full duty job, and so I think that kind of embodies not only the empathy piece and making sure that we're taking care of the injured workers and being mindful of the cost of the claim as well, but also getting creative on the fly and doing what's best for the injured workers. So hopefully I did that justice. This is an incredible win on our behalf, and I'm just so grateful to work with adjusters that put that level of care into injured workers.
Speaker 1:It's a big deal, chris, and it was a big deal for that injured worker. His goal was to go back to work and he was able to do that and he regained quality of life and that was a true partnership. Sometimes we get caught up in the jurisdictions. This particular jurisdiction us as a carrier had no control. This injured worker could do whatever he wanted, go wherever he wanted, and the way we achieved that outcome was going back to that empathetic resolution model. And the way we achieved that outcome was going back to that empathetic resolution model, creating a partnership. And as we built that partnership that allowed for him to be open-minded to some alternatives that, yes, we put some money on the front end, but 5,000-foot view, man, this was the best outcome for the carrier, the best outcome for the injured worker and the best outcome for the insured because they kept an employee in the industry. So I love sharing that.
Speaker 1:If you guys want to hear more about that, go find the podcast Adjusted, that our company offers, which has stories about that and others other topics as well. So thank you, chris. I do want to remind folks, as we move on to the next real success story, to go ahead and start putting out questions that you might have for our Q&A, because that segment's coming up next. So if you do have some questions, we want to get those in that Q&A as a reminder so you can type them in there and we'll get to them as we move forward. So, switching gears to risk management, duane, I want to hear from you what's one of the true success stories that you're proud of as you think about your risk management team.
Speaker 4:Happy to share. We had a battery manufacturer come to us a few years ago, greg mentioned earlier. We have a very unique appetite for workers' compensation from mining underground to telecommunications at height, to battery manufacturing the list goes on. But it's really cool what we're able to do for folks in tough spots or that do hard work. We're a great solution. But this battery manufacturer came to us after having some frequency issues, especially in the area of material handling. And what I mean by frequency is they're having a lot of claims of material handling, and what I mean by frequency is they're having a lot of claims and this had driven their experience modification rating up to nearly one and a half and they're paying over 100 grand more a year for workers' comp than they needed to.
Speaker 4:I got close with this client right off the bat because they were drawn to our services due to the high mod and how much they were paying for the insurance and immediately got in there again. Boots on the ground. We are wearing Carhartts and boots, not suits. We are industry professionals, can't stress that enough. So get out there, spend some time with the client, come up with a strategy, and this strategy involved a lot of engineering and this company. I'll just plug it Berkeley Industrial Comp is constantly investing in its employees so that we can better serve you. 2022,.
Speaker 4:I wrapped up my Master of Engineering at University of Alabama, birmingham, and the company paid for that so that I can better serve every one of you.
Speaker 4:I took what I learned there primarily in prevention through design and worked with this battery manufacturer, made assessments, reviewed their data and used different hazard analysis techniques to come up with additional safety trainings, adjusted safety trainings as well as better engineering solutions in their processes, and the results were staggering. Really, within a year, frequency was down 40% and recordable injuries were down to zero Today. I checked with the client yesterday because I knew this was coming up. They're coming up on 1,200 days recordable free Frequency down 40%. You've got to think deeper than that. Productivity increased as well, because now we're not having all the lost time that we used to have and three years down the road, that mod is now back around one. So this was a huge win for them and for us. Although we're not taking in as much premium as we initially were a few years back, we're hanging on to most of it and that's just as important. So that was just a great example I wanted to share with everybody about a win-win outcome for the client and for Berkeley.
Speaker 1:I love that story, dwayne, and really what we're about, whether it's an injured worker who has a difficult claim or whether it's coming up with a creative solution on the risk management side to help improve our insured's results. At the end of the day, we really believe our expertise will drive down costs over time for our insureds if they work with us and partner with us. Our combination of expertise on the claim side, on the safety side and on our business engagement team really separates us. Well, I wanted to switch gears a little bit and I know you feel passionate about business engagement.
Speaker 1:This was something that didn't exist. This was something we as an organization thought where is our pain point for our insurers and our agents? And we started realizing it was. Well, they've got all these questions and they need answers to them. And while you've spent so much time trying to problem solve around, how do we make things easy for our agents, how do we make things easy for our insurers and how do we actually engage with them in meaningful ways? So I'm going to pass the baton to you to talk a little bit about what that success story is on the business engagement side.
Speaker 2:Happy to so. As I mentioned, an option that you have on onboarding is that you can click the link to schedule a meeting with me, and so the success story I want to share with you is about a policyholder that did just that. So we scheduled a meeting where they can share their screen. I can share ours. They have my undivided attention to answer any questions that they have. In this onboarding experience. We highlighted the options on how you can port a claim, and MedCall, as we mentioned earlier, is one of those options, and so they explained to me at the time that they already had their own vendor that they were using, that they were totally satisfied with, and that they, at that time, were choosing, and I said that is your decision. I just want to highlight why we do recommend MedCall and walk through those steps with them, and I said think about that, and at some point, if you want to try out MedCall, I encourage you to try an experience with MedCall and then try an experience with your current vendor and see what the differences are, to make an educated decision on that. Additionally, they are paying for this service on their own, and MedCall is included in their policy with us. So whatever it is that the amount, and they were able to tell me in the end what that amount was, that expense that they were paying on their own, and they could transfer that to us. I said please keep those facts in mind as you're making these decisions, so unbeknownst to me. Then that policyholder did test out MedCall and, as a matter of fact, did a couple, and then they scheduled another meeting with me this is mid-policy when they said we're ready to start making this change. So the things I want to highlight about that experience was they thought that they wanted to make this switch, but they said these are our concerns, can you please address them? And so I want to make sure that you're aware that this is available to you as well. About MedCall, they had special instructions that they wanted to provide. If an injured employee called from their policy about after accident drug screening, we always want them to go to this place, and then we always want to make sure that the HR representative is notified after a claim comes in, and then we have special department code to be listed if they're on second shift and all of these different types of concerns and wanting to make sure that that was going to meet their need. We met all of them and then they successfully transferred over to utilizing MedCall for all of their claim reporting at that time and again they were able to tell me the money that they were spending and had spent on that outside vendor. That had then been us.
Speaker 2:Going back to the highlights of MedCall again 24-7,. They're there on the weekends, you know. They're there on holidays. They offer translation services, so sometimes that's a need for our policyholders and our injured workers. Again, what sets MedCall aside is that this is an ER physician.
Speaker 2:A lot of the other vendors that are out there are a nurse to a physician, which is different. They can diagnose things over the phone. They can write prescriptions. They can do those kinds of things because they're a physician. They also customize, like I said, that they would be going to a certain location at that. So all of that is customizable and each policyholder can choose what it is that they want to make sure that their injured employees are being told and communicated with.
Speaker 2:Additionally, they're making sure that they know about the pharmacy card, our first fill card, if they're going to go get a prescription filled.
Speaker 2:Having that first fill card on their person when they're going to the pharmacy is making sure that they're not paying for that out of their own pocket pocket and all of those details when they need it, at the time that they're injured and they're going to get care or they're going to fill a prescription, that they have all of that information at their fingertips because they can text that information to them and make sure that they have it. So in a really stressful time for that injured employee, someone is there to give them all of those details when they need it. We try to communicate that to you in advance and make sure you have it. But then sometimes you can't remember where that claim kit is. But MedCall has that. So I count that as a huge success story. Where they already had a vendor that they were using. We said, hey, give it a try, and they were ending up able to move their claim reporting over to MedCall. So we're happy to have that experience.
Speaker 4:Your claim gets set up when you call it in through MedCall. It's not something you need to redo in the portal or send in through email.
Speaker 2:Yes. So a lot of times when your injured employee is going to go receive care, sometimes the specialist won't even see that injured employee until they know who the adjuster is and what that claim number is, because MedCall sets that up. Immediately you have a claim number and immediately you can see who the adjuster is. So that's another good point that a lot of times now ER, of course, or an urgent care they're going to see them without a claim number, but many times they know this is a specialized injury and you are immediately transferred over to a specialist. You've got an immediate claim number and an adjuster assigned.
Speaker 1:That's a great, great example, Luella, and I remember when we made the move to MedCall and there was a discussion about, well, how do we want to handle this, Are we going to build this like we build medical providers? And we made the internal decision and I felt pretty passionate about this that we should cover that cost. And the reason is we want to make it easy for you to do the right thing and report the claim, and we believe that if we can get in front of claims, we're going to cut the cost down for you and we want to make it as easy as possible for you to report a claim so that you don't have to have somebody who's well-trained and knows exactly what form to fill out. We want to make it easy for our policyholders to do the right thing so we can get the results that we want to obtain. So great, great answer, Luella.
Speaker 1:We're going to move to the question and answer, and I think this one actually is right for you, Luella, so I'm actually going to kick this one to you. The question is, if I'm an HR manager and we know that with some of our policyholders we have smaller policyholders, that some of them may not have a safety guy like Dwayne was talking about, and maybe the HR department is reporting claims and handling safety. So if I'm an HR manager that's picking up after a policy's initial onboarding and I'd like to walk through an onboarding experience that I'm fully informed, how do I go about doing that?
Speaker 2:So you can reach out to me directly.
Speaker 2:You can call us, you can, you know, so we have a virtual attendant and just say hey, I'd like to schedule a meeting with Luella Alcorn.
Speaker 2:What I do when I send an email to someone, it has the link also in my email where it says book a meeting with Luella Alcorn. So I'm happy to do that. I'm assuming maybe our contact information can be provided at the end of this webinar or after the fact. But I'm here and we're available and if, for whatever reason, someone in my team needs to do that as well, anybody on my team can handle any questions that you have. The other thing that I'll point out as to why this is important that we have the correct contacts Through the life of your policy, an HR person could leave and a new one could come in, so we could have done the onboarding and you knew the information at the inception of your policy. But if then you have a change or someone takes on new duties, sometimes even through the life of your policy, you need another meeting or you need another update on you know how to do things. We're happy to give all that information whenever it is you need it.
Speaker 1:That's exactly right. So all you need to do is reach out to Luella and she will get you taken care of. We take a hands-on approach and we were really proud of that, and there are a lot of resources on our portal that are very, very helpful that you might not know are even there, and Luella can walk you through and show you where those are and how they work. And our goal is to meet you where you're at, and that's when we created business engagement. That was the whole purpose of that was. We know some people want that hands-on approach, other people they want a video, other people they want an email, and so we want to meet you where you're at and we're committed to putting in the time where you need it. So I wanted to be sure that I highlight that those resources are there and our goal is to make it easy, whether that's our safety person having somebody like Dwayne come out and visit and look and see what they can do to help you, or whether you have that claim and you need an update. Chris's team is going to be on it and we're going to make sure that we get you the answers that you need.
Speaker 1:One question that I saw come in and we don't have underwriting represented here. So I'm walking into deep water, but I'm going to do my very best. So there was a question that came through that asked a little bit about how saving costs on claims affects the future premium. And that's a really complicated question so I'm going to try to simplify it and make it as easy as possible to understand. But basically, every industry that there is has a class code and those class codes represent what the risk is for that particular industry. For example, my job sitting in this office is a very different risk than a heavy equipment operator and so premium is going to be based on the general risk of that position and payroll associated with that position across the board. And then where it gets a little more complicated is that each company has their exact results and that is compared to the industry. So let's say Dwayne has a team that does construction and they are fantastic, they are way safer than everybody else. Then that's going to affect their experience mod and I'm not going to go deep into experience mod training. But on the flip side, let's say Chris has a team and they are not safe at all. They're getting hurt left and right. Then Chris's team, their premium is going to be more expensive, and the way that's generally looked at is the last three policy years, not including the current policy year. So it takes a little while, as you have good outcomes, for that to roll off. But if you're consistent on changing your safety behaviors and you have a claims team that is proactively handling your claims so that they don't end up becoming claims that explode beyond what the exposure should be, then over time that experience rating is going to go down and that's going to result in your premium going down, not to mention the added services we've already talked about, where you have the ability to call a guy like Dwayne and have him come out and work with you, or if you have a question about the portal or how to report something, you've got Luella at your fingertips. Or if you need that claim update and you have a question about returning to work, chris has got answers for you. So we really believe that's where we separate ourselves as relationships. I will say we had an insured of ours and I love this story because I think it highlights how we're special.
Speaker 1:They ended up and it wasn't their HR person that made this decision. It was someone else, but they made the decision to leave us because of price. They found someone to offer them a lower price it wasn't a lot lower, but it was a little lower and they left us. And I got a phone call a couple months later where they said we need to have this claim reassigned. This is the worst I've ever seen. The communication skills are terrible. I can't get them to call me back. The communication skills are terrible. I can't get them to call me back. My people are out in the field. I've told them five different times that I'm out in the field, that you got to call my cell phone, and they keep calling the office and they keep leaving messages. I'm demanding that you have this claim reassigned. And I said, ok, well, let me take a look into it. Give me the claim number.
Speaker 1:And as soon as I got the claim number, I realized it was their new carrier. And as soon as I got the claim number, I realized it was their new carrier and I won't say who it was, because we're going to be friendly. But he was so frustrated because he wasn't getting the communication that he needed and he had gotten used to the expectation that we keep our staff here. We answer our phones. We solve your problems and we really pride ourselves in that, and we believe that over time, you're the one that will benefit from that as a policyholder, because you're going to have a lower experience amount over time. It might not be tomorrow and it might not be next year, but we believe if we have that kind of partnership, we can really make an impact.
Speaker 1:I just want you to know that, as far as I'm concerned, I'm really proud of what we do. I tell my team every day that I work with the best people I've ever worked with any time in my career. Not only are they amazing professionals that are experts at what they do, but they're truly my friends, and work is a lot more fun when you work with amazing people who have incredible integrity and want to do the right thing and win together. And we really hope that if you're an agent out there and you're listening to this, that you keep us in mind for future opportunities. That if you are insured and you weren't aware of some of the resources that we have, that you reach out and check in with us so that we can help you win together. And we hope that in future webinars we're able to address additional questions that you might have, so please keep them coming and let's keep our communication channels open. Thanks, everybody.