I received a letter from Charles Verre, Chief Administrative Officer of the Workers’ Compensation Section of the Division of Industrial Relations responding to my request for more information about the number of benefit penalties against insurers and third-party administrators by DIR. (DIR investigates complaints by injured workers that insurers and/or their third-party administrators are violating Nevada’s workers’ compensation laws. If a violation is found, DIR may also assess a benefit penalty that is payable to the injured worker.) I previously wrote in a blog post that after DIR gave me statistics, Mr. Verre told me during the DIR conference that DIR didn’t have good statistics to give me because they had an old computer system and DIR couldn’t properly track this information.
Mr. Verre wrote to me on January 23, 2014, that for fiscal year 2013 (7/1/2012 through 6/30/2013), they issued 13 benefit penalties against insurers and third-party administrators, and that $20,625 was paid in benefit penalties to injured workers during that time period. Mr. Verre also stated that DIR does not collect benefit penalties on behalf of the injured worker. He didn’t tell me the amount that was assessed against insurers and administrators.
