By Ruth Kiefer, Vice President of Loss Control
When you have a new hire, or you need to renew your employee’s industrial truck licenses have you ever wished you had a little assistance? Or a place for them to turn to have the class training? Well, I’m here to tell you, we have that assistance for you!
(more…)We made it through the holidays. And Michigan winter is finally upon us. So is the closing of calendar year 2022. The MTM midyear actuarial review and subsequent monthly loss reviews are encouraging for our ninth MTM annual dividend in a row. That’s the preliminary good news. This is always a stressful time for me. We have had a good year so far, we are waiting to close the year with hopefully no large shock losses, and then we work with our actuary on the final loss numbers for the year. This year the normal year end closing stress is a bit higher. Remember that we moved the annual member’s meeting from October to early March. Traditionally at the October meeting we have given a brief synopsis of how the year looked through 9 months. It was always an estimate since there were still three months to go and large surprise losses can happen. However, this year with the annual member’s meeting in March, we won’t be giving you an estimate, but we’ll actually be giving you the year end result. As I have mentioned in an earlier newsletter, if all goes to plan we will have a great speaker, a great meal, and then hand out member dividend checks. Talk about pressure—however you can help—using your loss control skills and the MTM loss control team please do all you can to close out the holiday season with minimal losses. It’s good for your workers, it’s good for you, and it’s good for your dividend calculation.
(more…)By Megan Brown, ARM, CWCP, CACW,
Vice President of Sales & Marketing
Nicole joined MTMIC as the Marketing Manager in November, 2022 bringing 10 years of insurance experience with a focus on Underwriting and working closely with agents on writing good business. She is trained in both personal and commercial lines, with an emphasis on Workers’ Compensation for the last few years. Nicole has a Master’s Degree in Business (MBA) and has obtained her Certified Authority on Workers’ Compensation (CAWC), Associate in Insurance (AINS) designations and is currently working towards her Chartered Property and Casualty Underwriter (CPCU) designation.
Nicole is very much a free spirit. She has a passion for working with people and building relationships. She grew up in a small town in Northern Michigan, right on Lake Huron so she has always had a love of being around the water. In the summer months, in her spare time, you will most likely find Nicole on a beach somewhere! She also enjoys spending time with her three kids, traveling, and working on her long bucket list with skydiving and bungee jumping as her next adventures to cross off her list!
The same dedicated staff remain in the Marketing department and I would like to share a little bit about them.
(more…)In the last MTM newsletter I announced that MTM management and Board decided to move the traditional annual members’ meeting from October to March. The goal was to try a different time of year in hopes of improving turnout among members. One of the draws besides great speakers and meeting other MTM shop owners would be that in March we will know final yearend results. What a nice enhancement to the members’ meeting, instead of talking about a possible members’ dividend we hand out members’ dividend checks.
(more…)By Glenda Moyle, Premium Accounting Manager
Well, we have started working on the January 2023 renewals. I have been working on these for over 35 years and it’s hard to believe that another year has sped by.
If you have an effective date in January you should have already received your payroll renewal form asking for new estimated payrolls for the 2023 policy year. The goal to accurately estimate payrolls reduces the chance of a surprise audit additional premium.
A common question I hear is what do we do if the payroll estimate form is not returned to MTMIC? Well, we use the higher of your 2021 audited payrolls or your current policy (2022 estimated) payrolls for your quote. It is never too late to send us back the form as we can always revise your payment schedule.
If you need another copy of the payroll form please contact me at Glenda.moyle@mtmic.com
Also, the 2023 renewal quote documents will be going out at the end of November so please watch your mail for them.
For over ten years, the MTM Annual Members Meeting has been held the third Thursday of October. That’s outlined in the MTM bylaws and it’s an item that staff looks forward to putting on for our members every year. For the last five years or so we’ve held it at The Inn at St. John’s in Plymouth, Michigan. We had great reviews on the location, meeting room, and food. It’s a hard place to complain about. In May, we held the second quarter MTM Board meeting. A topic that was discussed was how can we increase the number of members that attend our annual meeting. Over the last ten years, the number of attendees bounces between 100 and 150, not taking into account the two years of cancellation or scale backs caused by COVID. We were already underway for our October 2022 meeting when this discussion took us all to a new point of how could we make the meeting better, maybe try something different.
(more…)About eight years ago, MTM management thought that getting an outside rating agency valuation of MTM would be helpful to the Board of Directors and MTM members. At that time, management felt confident about our results and financial integrity, however, having an outside agency conduct their own independent evaluation would be a proof source of what management was telling the Board of Directors and members. We chose an outside rating agency called Demotech. Demotech had over 30 years of small and mid-size insurance company rating evaluations, and was a known standard for insurance company evaluations. We proceeded down that path and received an “A, Exceptional” rating from Demotech. About three years later, we received an upgrade from Demotech one step higher to “A Prime Unsurpassed.”
Even with our Demotech rating, occasionally questions arose because the rating agency used by large insurance companies is a company called AM Best. AM Best is actually an individual’s name, Alfred M. Best, who started insurance company ratings over 100 years ago. AM Best specializes in large companies, but because of its history it remains the world gold standard for insurance company ratings.
(more…)The Compensation Advisory Organization of Michigan (CAOM) is responsible for a number of tasks including promulgation of modification factors, collecting and analyzing policy and claims data from all insurers writing workers’ comp insurance in Michigan, and administration of the Michigan Workers Compensation Placement Facility. They are governed by a nine-member Board of Governors. The members are a combination of local, regional and national carriers writing workers’ compensation policies in Michigan, with each carrier represented by an officer of their company. In October 2019 MTMIC was appointed to fill the seat from which another carrier resigned, with our CFO Chris Doebler designated as our representative. In April 2021 MTMIC was appointed to be vice-chair of CAOM and in April 2022 MTMIC, our representative Chris Doebler took on the role of Chair of the organization. Chris will serve in that role for the next year and, at the April 2023 Board of Governors meeting, will take on the role of Past Chair, with the current vice-chair moving up to the Chair position. Congrats Chris!
My name is Faris Saleem, the new intern at MTM. I started my role this past March and, so far, it has been one of the best work experiences. The wide range of fields offered at MTM such as business, accounting, finance, and marketing will present new opportunities for learning. I’m excited to explore these fields and my role at MTM. Previously, I was employed in the technology space as a computer specialist at Best Buy. I’m more than happy to offer my technological background to assist the office in any way I can. This May, I will be graduating from Schoolcraft College with my Associate of Science degree. In the fall, I plan to pursue my bachelor’s degree in computer science at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Outside of MTM and school, I enjoy traveling, washing my car, and building computers. I’m thrilled to continue working at MTM, and I look forward to meeting more of you soon.
Well, this will be an unusually short article. Why – because the montage of enclosed pictures tells the story better than I can. Hundreds of shops getting checks. I met MTM members I have called upon for 8 years. I met some long term members, some new members that I had not visited before. To speed the delivery process my thanks to agents who agreed to deliver checks, to MTM Loss Control staff who worked for 3 weeks delivering checks in-between Loss Control visits and to Megan Brown, VP of Sales who is the fastest driver of the delivery team. The goal was to get the money to MTM members in three weeks. A check gift is not nearly as attractive if delivered in 6 or 8 weeks. In a few locations, some checks were delivered by mail. Our least preferred delivery method. Most checks were delivered by a real person delivering to a real customer.
I hope you enjoy the pictures. A couple comments on pictures: Some MTM members (mostly ladies) are camera shy. Their comments: Really, I have to take a picture? Some of the pictures show the steps these ladies will go to, to avoid a picture. Notice the check covering the face one. Notice the robot holding the check vs the office manager. You get the drift.
Delivering $4,000,000 is very fun. Let’s do it again next March.
Thursday morning, February 17th, the MTM Board met to review the recommendations from both the Board Marketing committee and the Board Finance committee. Those two committees do a preliminary review of financial results, and also structure the MTM member dividend program. At the end of the Marketing committee, a recommendation was made to the full Board for the parameters of this year’s dividend program. The following week, the Board Finance committee met to review the actuarial loss report, and the financial information provided by MTM management.
(more…)With the fiscal year closed, Chris Doebler our CFO has been working long hours to put the 2021 loss and financial reports for our independent actuarial team together. At the end of January, Chris and I meet with our lead actuary to review the 134-page report on the year’s loss results. Lots of detail reviewed with evaluations completed with multiple methodologies. Predicting the future value of 2021 claims that recently happened and how prior year claims are being presently handled today is as much an art as it is a science. On January 31, the actuarial team, Chris and I all agreed on the 2021 “loss numbers”. Now we quickly plug those into the financial statements for profit review.
From an overall loss review, a few findings are apparent. The 2021 year was not a get back to “normal” year that we all had hoped for back in January 2021. The COVID disruptions were different than 2020, but still a significant factor in our business and personal lives. In aggerate our members activities grew for 2020, but not back to 2018 or 2019. Maybe this slower pace contributed to a reduction in frequency of severe losses. We had no fatalities in 2021 and fewer severe losses such as amputations. That is the good news. On the bad news side, we saw an increase in losses for new employees (90 days or less). Training was an issue in nearly all these cases. We understand the pressure to produce product and get the new employees in the production process. From our accident reviews, training and supervision of the new employees is a shop challenge. While it is most challenging to take the time to train in today’s world, I can report firsthand that a serious injury is the surest way to stop all shop production. It is important to the shop’s success that we send the employee home in the same condition as they arrived in the morning.
Our Loss Control staff is focusing on that issue for our members’ benefit. My task for the next couple weeks is to work the members’ dividend through the Board Marketing, Board Finance, and then full Board meetings. Our goal is to finalize MTM members’ declaration before February 17th and then manage the print and reporting process for deliveries to begin March 1st. In the meantime, you can help our next year’s dividend by paying special attention to your newest employees.
Be safe and see you soon. – John
Late Friday afternoon, December 31st, we closed the 2021 financial year for MTM. As we get close to the end of the year, management’s concern always increases. We have a good year and hopefully nothing happens in the last week, two weeks or month that would harm the good year that was already on the books. I’m pleased to report that no large claims occurred in the last week and month. December loss ratio looks good and that is attached to a good loss ratio year for 2021. While we have our raw loss numbers, we send our loss data for an independent actuarial review which is completed in January. This process is detailed.
(more…)A couple months ago I wrote you about out-of-state staff i.e., when you have employees in states other than Michigan. Trying to avoid the 27-point test, I broke it down to a few simple points that work in nearly all cases. That article prompted many calls from you, and I think we answered your individual questions. With that topic mostly behind us, the next logical area is “when are my subcontractors (and their employees) MY employees?” Like the complicated list of test questions for an employee’s coverage state, the sub-contactor test is just as complicated and varies widely by state. I will focus on Michigan rules but use a couple other state examples to illustrate the state differences.
(more…)Part of my daily tasks is answering member’s questions. When a particular question begins to surface weekly, it’s time to share the question and answer with all of our members. The recent regular question looks like this “Is my employee in Indiana covered by my MTM policy?” With more remote working going on especially in sales and clerical/engineering jobs it seems logical that this question is coming up more.
While the rules can vary by state, and in fact even in Michigan there is a complicated more than 15 question criteria that is used, there are three or four much more simple questions that answer the vast majority of situations. Because our members need quick reference answers, let me walk you through this simple criteria.
(more…)Normally each month I update you on changes in workers’ compensation law, operating environment, MTM news or questions I have recently received from members. An important item, that I should inform you about is how to we manage the money MTM members entrust us with. That ties into a very common question, tell me about MTM’s financial security. MTM is NOT a billion dollar national insurance company. We ARE a mutual insurer owned by 941 Michigan employers. One can argue that there is more stability in these large international companies, but events over the last ten years have shown that large does not necessarily mean stable. Financial stability also factors into how the MTM Board of Directors review our annual members’ dividend. Over the last seven years, the MTM Board of Directors has returned $27 million dollars as owner member dividends. That equates on average to 30% of the annual premium. Dividend payments starts with financial stability. It does not do any good to return monies to member owners only to say that we’ve come up short and need more money to pay claims. So while the dividend part of the member equation is critical, making sure that the financial stability of MTM comes first.
(more…)Every quarter the MTM Board of Directors meet. No surprise the MTM management team prepare a variety of reports for Board review. The 11 MTM Board members are just like you, shop owners, CFOs, plant managers, safety managers, H.R and the like. For the upcoming meeting, I thought the Board would be interested in a big picture of what we learned from the completed payroll/premium audits for 2020 policies. Those audits often take 3-6 months before all is finalized.
Back in January/February of 2020 there was some chatter about a contagious disease, but nothing much changed until mid-March. Then most everything was locked down. MTM had just begun delivering member dividend checks and we found we had to slip the check under the door if someone was at the shop at all. With a rapid decrease in shop payroll, we offered to make premium payment adjustments, knowing that some shops were closed or operating at very reduced staff. To our surprise, we had fewer shops requesting that assistance than we expected. That gave us the feeling that more shops were operating as essential than we first thought.
(more…)Finally, back to some normalcy. It’s been over a year, but finally MTM Board and Committee members are together again. Maybe 2/3’s of the members were at the MTM office and 1/3 via Zoom. It was great to see our Board and Committee members. It was like a family reunion. At the May 20th Board meeting Joe Keppler, MTM Chairman of the
Board welcomed our new Board member Barry Kavanagh. Barry might hit a memory cell for you because about 3 years ago I introduced him as a new Board Finance Committee member.
Here’s a refresher: Barry received his bachelor degree from Waterford Institute of Technology in his native Ireland. He is a Fellow of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), the main accountancy body in the United Kingdom, Europe, and Asia. He also holds a certified management accounting certification from the U.S. Institute of Management Accountants. Barry has been involved with MTM for nearly 15 years. At the beginning we worked with Barry when he was the Controller at a Lansing member’s shop. For the last 8 years, Barry has been the VP of Finance at Avalon & Tahoe Mfg. Inc. That company name might sound familiar too. Avalon & Tahoe is a high end Michigan manufacturer of pontoon boats. They make virtually everything on their boats except the motors and gauges. It is a fascinating company. The company won the Michigan Manufacturers Association “Michigan Manufacturer of the Year” award for 2019.
Well, back to Barry. After two and a half years of successful work on the Board Finance Committee, the Board asked him to join them on the full Board. Consistent with Barry’s enthusiasm on the Board Finance Committee, he agreed to the new position as long as he could retain his Board Finance Committee assignment. The Chairman of the Board of MTM approved his request. Barry has been a valuable contributor to the Board Finance Committee, and we are expecting that same solid contribution to the full MTM Board.
Lastly, with many of our in person activities resuming, we are planning the Annual Member’s Meeting October 21st (11 a.m. – 2 p.m.). As it has been for the last 6 years, the get together will be held at The Inn at St. Johns, Plymouth, Michigan. The Inn is a first class location and there is no “convention food” served. All Board and Committee members attend this meeting as does the entire MTM staff. We hope you can join us.
