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Bill Analysis

Summary: Under present law, employers can obtain workers' compensation insurance coverage through licensed insurance companies or through self-insurance. Current law lacks clarity on how certain workers' compensation provisions apply to temporary employment services. H.B. 1762 provides certain provisions applying to workers' compensation insurance coverage for temporary employees.

HB 1762 would allow a certificate of insurance coverage that shows a temporary employment service maintains a workers' compensation policy to serve as proof that the service maintains workers' compensation insurance for all of its employees. HB 1762 requires political subdivisions to accept this as proof of coverage under Chapter 406 of the Labor Code dealing with Workers Compensation Coverage. Temporary employment services and their clients would still be subject to law governing employee elections and law that makes workers compensation benefits the exclusive remedy for workplace related death or injury.

Analysis: HB 1762 makes the workers compensation insurance process for temporary employment services and their clients more understandable by adding language that states explicitly the ability of these entities to participate in workers compensation insurance. This makes the legal issues surrounding worker's compensation insurance more predictable and clear for temporary employee services. Without commenting on the value or necessity of the underlying issue of workers' compensation insurance, we recognize that this narrow legislation makes an unclear law more clearly defined. As the law stands now, there is a reasonable chance the law may be applied differently in different jurisdictions. By making the law clear, this bill should help ensure the law is applied equally across jurisdictions. We support HB 1762.