If you’ve ever heard a company talking about their EMR score before, you might be wondering what it is or why it should matter to you. Technically, the score was created for insurance purposes. However, it’s also a really good indicator about the quality of contractor you’re hiring.
Keep reading to learn more about the EMR score, how and why it’s calculated, and how you can use it to choose more reliable contractors for your business.
What Is an EMR Score?
EMR stands for Experience Modification Rating. This is a metric that insurance companies use to decide how much a company has to pay for their workers’ compensation insurance plans. If insurers determine a company to be high risk, their EMR score goes up as do their insurance costs.
You can also think of an EMR score like a credit rating for businesses. In other words, the better the EMR score, the more trustworthy they are when it comes to health and safety. What’s more, if a company can maintain a stellar EMR, it’s usually a good indicator of their overall trustworthiness.
How the EMR Score Gets Calculated
The EMR is calculated based on the rate of injury and workers’ compensation claims reported within a workplace or by a company. The lower these are, the lower the business’s insurance rates will be.
Typically, insurers look at these factors from the last few years:
- Company payroll data
- Workers’ compensation claim history
- Expected losses due to injury
Even then, it’s not that simple.
Smaller workers’ compensation claims (i.e. under $17,000) can more greatly impact a company’s EMR. Why? Because insurers want to encourage businesses to prevent minor incidents from frequently happening. Even if a business reports a few small incidents, they could be seen as more risky to insurers than a business that had just one major accident in the last few years.
It also depends on the outcome. For instance, an employee who sustains an injury that requires minimal treatment and no time off might not affect the employer’s EMR too much. On the other hand, an employee who requires significant medical care and extended time off work probably will.
What Is a Good EMR Score?
The standard EMR score is 1.0. It’s not a great score, but it’s not bad either. Think of it like getting a “C” in school.
Unlike our school’s grading systems, though, the goal is to get a lower EMR. For example, a business with an outstanding safety record will have an EMR score under 1.0.
What’s important to note is that the EMR score gets updated every year.
So, if you’re considering hiring a contractor, ask to see what their EMR history is. One that keeps their score low and steady would be a good pick. Also look for contractors that have improved their EMR over time. That’s a good sign that they take job safety seriously and are actively working to improve it.
How We Prioritize Safety
As of writing this, Dean E. Norris’s EMR score stands at 0.66. We’re proud of the work our team does to create a safety-first work environment. Our policies include:
- Having a designated safety director
- Ongoing management oversight
- Well-documented safety procedures
- Use of personal protective equipment (PPE)
- Extensive safety and health training
- Careful record keeping of work-related injuries and illnesses
- Ongoing safety audits and implementation of corrective measures
- Work site reviews for possible hazards and risks
- Solicitation of feedback on how we can improve
Our EMR score is a testament to our commitment to keeping our workers safe. At the same time, it directly benefits our customers.
One of the reasons why some HVAC providers are more expensive than others is because they pass off the costs of expensive workers’ compensation rates onto their customers. By maintaining a good EMR score, we’re able to keep our insurance costs low and, in return, our customer pricing.