Last legislative session, HB 1521 passed and imposed a “duty of good faith and fair dealing” on self-insured cities and other municipal employers, and their third-party administrators. 18 cities in Washington are self-insured for workers’ compensation. The Department of Labor & Industries is now working on implementation rules and is holding stakeholder meetings to help shape the new rules.
The bill specifically mentions coercing a worker to accept less than their due compensation as a violation of the duty. The bill requires the Department of Labor & Industries to adopt rules defining additional good faith violations and determining penalties for such violations. We previously wrote about the bill as it made its way through the legislature.
L&I is hosting two preliminary feedback sessions for the employer community to roll out their draft rules and solicit feedback from stakeholders before they come out with revised proposed rules to take into the formal rulemaking process. Prior to the first meeting, L&I sent out draft proposed rules ahead of the first meeting. You can find those draft rules here.
The first meeting took place on November 1, and self-insured employers brought up a number of concerns with the draft rules, including concerns about defining “good faith and fair dealing,” balancing employer and employee interests in claims management, and a new requirement for cities to provide surety even if they haven’t violated the new good faith statute to the point of losing their self-insured status.
The next meeting will take place on December 4, and if you are interested in participating, you can find the meeting information below. RSVP for the meeting here. You can either attend in person or virtually:
| December 4 @ 10 am |
Physical location | L&I Tumwater building
7273 Linderson Way SW
Tumwater WA 98501 Auditorium S117-S119 |
Virtual location | Join meeting
Meeting ID: 891 2293 9894
Passcode: YCv0.=s.
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