The 2017-2018 New York budget (Part NNN of Chapter 59, Laws of 2017), enacted effective April 10, 2017, includes numerous reforms to the New York Workers’ Compensation system.
The Board issued a Board bulletin this week detailing some of the more important changes.
- Cap on temporary disability benefits: The reforms amend Workers’ Compensation Law §15(3)(w) to provide carriers and self-insured employers a credit for periods of temporary disability that extend beyond 2.5 years (130 weeks) from the date of injury. It is important to note that this cap on temporary indemnity benefits does not affect claims prior to April 9, 2017.
- Labor Market Attachment Post-Classification: The statutory changes provide that a claimant who is classified with a permanent partial disability is no longer required to demonstrate ongoing labor market attachment. The statutory change does not affect the question of attachment during periods of temporary disability prior to classification. This rule takes effect immediately. This is a significant change as claimant’s with even a minimum 1% LWEC will be entitled to ongoing indemnity benefits for causally related lost time without having to remain attached to the labor market.
- Extreme Hardship Determination Threshold Lowered: The threshold for determining when a claimant with a permanent partial disability may apply to the Board for a redetermination due to extreme hardship has been lowered. Claimants who are found to have a loss of wage earning capacity (LWEC) of greater than 75% may now apply for such determination (formerly the threshold was greater than 80%). This rule takes effect immediately. The rule also applies to claimants whose claims were previously adjudicated with a LWEC greater than 75%. The Board issued a separate Bulletin addressing the process for Extreme Hardship Redetermination..
- Mandatory Full Board Review: When a Board Panel reduces an LWEC finding to below the safety net threshold, and the LWEC had previously been determined by a workers’ compensation law judge to exceed the threshold, any request for Full Board Review will be considered a request for Mandatory Full Board Review. This provision takes effect immediately. Basically, if the claimant is found to have a 75% LWEC or higher by the law judge and on appeal the Board Panel reduces the claimant’s LWEC to 74% or lower, should the claimant request a Full Board Review, the Full Board must review the decision.
- First Responder Stress Claims: The reforms will significantly affect First Responder Stress Claims. As we previously detailed in our article “Can Police Officers bring PTSD Occupational Disease Claims in New York?” for a mental injury premised on work-related stress to be compensable, the standard previously was that “the stress must be greater than that which usually occurs in the normal work environment.” Based on the 2017 reforms, first responders (i.e. police officers and firefighters, EMTs, paramedics, certified emergency medical providers, emergency dispatchers, and those with similar titles) who encounter extraordinary stress in a work-related emergency who file a claim for mental injury will not be barred from a compensable work-related stress claim because the stress they encountered in dealing with an extraordinary work-related emergency is “no-greater-than” the stress encountered by other similarly situated first responders. Of course, this change will likely result in litigation to determine what “extraordinary stress” in the context of a first responder is defined as because this is a fairly vague standard.
If you wish to have monthly NY workers’ compensation updates sent to your inbox, feel free to sign up for our monthly newsletter here. If you have a question about how the reforms impact your claim or any other New York Workers’ Compensation question, do not hesitate to contact me.
