D-Day – Premium Audit Bill Deadlines
Why would I post that this is premium audit D-Day? A majority of our clients renewed on 1/1/11. January 1 is still the date that a majority of companies renew their Workers Comp policies.
The premium audit cycle is that an insurance company premium auditor will have visited the companies renewing on 1/1 to audit the payroll for 2010. As with most of our clients, the auditor visited the employer in January or February.
An audit bill was then published along with the reasons for the increase in premiums. The bill, if not paid, has likely sat for about 3o days and the insurance carrier is now starting to turn up the heat to get the bill paid. This is when we receive urgent calls for assistance.
What do you do? The three WORST things to do are:
- File the bill away and ignore it
- Pay the bill without even reviewing how the auditor arrived at the numbers
- Start a “shell” dispute just to buy more time
As a minimum, the auditor’s numbers should be reviewed heavily to make sure your company is in agreement with them. If there are any questions on the numbers, all questions should be made in writing to the auditor. Sometimes, the policy or audit bill will give you a different person to contact if you have questions.
I do not recommend calling as email provides you with a paper trail of documentation if your questions are turned into a valid dispute.
If you ever feel you are in over your head with all these numbers and rules, it may save your company time and money to contact a non-agent professional for assistance. That is a shameless plug for our company.
If the questions you have sent are not answered timely, then you could raise a dispute on paying the premium audit bill until your questions are answered.
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