Experience Rating Methodology Updates: Check the Filing Before Reading Your Mod

NCCI says it completed a multi-year evaluation of the Plan's methodology and performance, and that Item E-1409 is meant to create a more predictive experience rating modification. According to NCCI, the filing's components include:

• a more equitable determination of primary and excess losses across states with different cost levels;
• more comparable Plan performance in states whose claim costs differ significantly from the countrywide average;
• mods that are less sensitive to large outlier claims;
• a more consistent calculation of each employer's expected claim count;
• recalibrated credibility parameters behind the weight and ballast values;
• removal of complex calculations that add no value.

The page also lists a fact sheet, FAQs, a filing summary and a webinar. It marks Items E-1409 and E-1409-A as content that requires authentication. So the public page tells you the filing exists and what it is meant to change; it does not show the formula, and nothing on it establishes how the factors work in your mod.

Two limits matter for a dispute. First, the page frames the revisions as "proposed" and ties them to each state's anticipated filing, so it does not by itself show that a particular state adopted E-1409 or on what date. Second, it does not say which filing governs your policy. Those are questions to put to your issuer or your state workers' compensation agency, and to test against the mod and worksheet issued for your rating effective date.

In NCCI's product documentation for experience rating mods and worksheets, the mod and worksheet service is part of NCCI's Riskworkstation application. The page describes the worksheet as the history used to calculate a business's experience rating, with the underlying loss and payroll detail and, for multistate risks, a state summary page. The mod itself is described as higher-level information, including historical mods for tracking trends over time.

That page describes access for NCCI's own service: a carrier of record can access an insured's worksheet, and someone who is not the carrier of record can use a written letter of authority from the insured. It lists per-item prices for mods and worksheets, but those are not repeated here as what your business would pay, since the access terms describe NCCI's service only and are not a rule for every worksheet issuer. If your mod comes from a different organization, the document and access process may differ, and the NCCI page cannot tell you that.

Use this as an organizing worksheet with your own records. It is not a legal requirement or a required procedure. Where a row names a possible source, treat it as a question to ask, not an assurance that the document exists or is available to you.

The last row is where many disputes turn practical. A methodology change and a data error are different problems, and the worksheet's loss and payroll detail is where you can test the second one. For a plain-language look at how the mod itself works, see Experience Modification Rate (EMR): What 1.0 Means and How the Mod Is Calculated, and for a check of why a mod changed without new claims, see Why Did My EMR Go Up With No New Claims?.

Because E-1409, as NCCI describes it, attaches to each state's own filing, the state is part of the question. The U.S. Department of Labor's state workers compensation officials directory points you to the appropriate state workers' compensation official and its website. It is a navigation aid only: it lists agency contact details, such as the Georgia State Board of Workers' Compensation or the New York Workers' Compensation Board, and it says nothing about rating rules, filing approvals or adoption dates. Use it to find the agency, then ask the agency or your issuer which rating rules apply to your policy date. The state guide for your state is a starting point for local context.

Suppose, purely as an assumption for illustration, that one employer has two policy periods with different rating effective dates, and a state filing took effect between them. The mod on the earlier worksheet and the mod on the later worksheet may then rest on different methodology, so comparing the two numbers side by side without noting the dates can mislead. This is an invented scenario, not a statement about any real state or filing; the point is only that the rating effective date and the filing date have to be lined up before the comparison means anything.

• Which rating effective date and policy period does the mod apply to?
• Which methodology or filing does the issuer say governs that date?
• Is the mod issued by NCCI, a state agency or another organization?
• Can I get the worksheet showing the loss and payroll entries behind the mod?
• If I am not the carrier of record, can I authorize access with a written letter of authority from the insured?

If you want to see how a modifier changes a subtotal, the workers' comp calculator lets you calculate a payroll-and-rate subtotal or compare modifiers you supply on the same confirmed pre-mod subject premium. It does not calculate an official EMR, supply market rates, establish eligibility or class codes, or predict future ratings, so treat its output as a renewal-preparation aid. For the broader coverage picture, see workers' compensation insurance, and for cost context see How Much Does Workers' Comp Cost? Official Figures and How to Read Them.

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