HB 643 -- Workers' Compensation Benefits

Co-Sponsors:  Lowe, LeVota, Burnett, Zweifel, George, Johnson
(90), Walsh

This bill makes several changes to the workers' compensation law.
The bill:

(1)  Changes the benefit for physical rehabilitation from $40 to
50% of the applicable temporary-total disability compensation
rate from the Second Injury Fund;

(2)  Eliminates the employers' or insurers' sole right to select
any physician, facility, or institution to provide physical
rehabilitation;

(3)  Entitles an employee who has received workers' compensation
benefits and has been released by his or her physician to return
to work to continuous employment with the same employer in the
same occupation engaged in when the employee left work without
reduction in wages or benefits;

(4)  Prohibits any reduction in Family and Medical Leave Act
entitlements or restoration rights, or any similar federal or
state laws, as a result of work time lost due to an occupational
injury or illness;

(5)  Requires the Director of the Division of Workers'
Compensation to determine if an injured worker has sustained an
injury that results in a loss of suitable, gainful employment
within 60 days from the employee's application for vocational
rehabilitation services instead of 120 days from the date of the
injury;

(6)  Requires rehabilitation practitioners or providers retained
by an employer to begin providing service within 10 days instead
of 90 days;

(7)  Allows the director, instead of the employer, to extend the
period of a vocational rehabilitation plan and extend it for a
reasonable period of time instead of only an additional 26 weeks.
The plan should seek to restore the employee to suitable, gainful
employment at a comparable wage.  The cost limit for the plan is
removed;

(8)  Sets the date at which interest penalties can be charged for
weekly benefit payments at 30 days past the due date;

(9)  Sets the weekly compensation level at 66.67% of the
employee's average weekly earnings and increases the maximum
weekly compensation paid to 200% of the state average weekly wage
and the minimum to 66.67% of the federal minimum wage after
August 28, 2003; and

(10)  Requires, in the case of a civil action of an employee
against an employer for discharge or discrimination due to the
exercise of any rights related to workers' compensation, that an
employee prove by a preponderance of the evidence that the
employer knew, or by the exercise of ordinary care, should have
known, that the discharge or discrimination was related to the
employee's exercise of his or her rights.

Missouri House of Representatives
Last Updated July 25, 2003 at 10:12 am