An audit of the Maryland Workers’ Compensation Commission found that regulators failed to track employers that do not carry workers compensation insurance and failed to keep adequate compliance records.
The Maryland General Assembly’s Office of Legislative Audits with the Department of Legislative Services conducted a fiscal compliance audit of the commission for the period from August 2018 to September 2022.
Dated July 27 but made public Friday, the audit found that the 10-member commission during that time period “did not use available information to proactively identify employers that did not have the required workers compensation insurance” and that the commission did not use records it obtains from the Maryland Department of Labor, Unemployment Insurance Division, to identify employers that may not have current workers comp coverage.
Auditors used state data and information from an insurance rating and data collection bureau to identify 1,650 employers with employees that “appeared” to lack workers comp coverage. A test of 20 employers on that list revealed that 19 did not have coverage, according to the report.
The audit also found that the commission did not maintain complete tracking records of actions taken against potentially noncompliant employers. An examination of the case docket records for a seven-day period disclosed that 21% of employers scheduled for hearings were not listed on the tracking records and 76% of records did not indicate the outcome of the cases.