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Summer is right around the corner, and with warmer temperatures will come teenagers looking for part-time work. But before you consider hiring someone under the age of 18 it's important to remember that there are special labor laws that govern how much teenagers can work and what they can do on the job.
A recent study by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill showed that many employers aren't following the law. The survey of 928 teenaged workers, 14 to 18 years old, showed that 52 percent of males and 43 percent of females use dangerous equipment such a box crushers and slicers, or serve and sell alcohol where it is consumed, despite federal child labor laws prohibiting these practices. Many of those under 16 reported working after 7 p.m. on a school night, something prohibited by federal law. And a third of teens in the survey said they received no safety training.
Knowing and following the law is important. State and federal authorities can impose hefty fines for violations of child labor laws. Violating the law can also expose your company to civil suits and potential embarrassment -- the U.S. Department of Labor regularly publicizes companies with egregious child labor law violations. It is also important to train mid-level managers on child labor regulations. They need to know when they can schedule teenagers to work and what tasks they can assign to them.
Know the law:
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A teenager must be at least 14 to work outside of a few exempt jobs, such as newspaper delivery.
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14- and 15-year-olds cannot work between 7 p.m. and 7 a.m. except from June 1 through Labor Day, when they can work until 9 p.m. There are also limits on how many hours they can work on a school day.
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There are many restrictions on what kinds of jobs teenagers younger than 18 can do. If the worker is under the age of 16 they are generally prohibited from doing anything that could be considered hazardous, such as running machinery. The U.S. Department of Labor maintains a list of jobs and duties that are restricted to those 18 and older.
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Your state may have additional restrictions on child labor. It is important to know of any additional regulations.
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Business owner package policies, or BOPs, are popular for a reason. They are a relatively hassle-free, one-size-fits-all option for many small business owners who don't want to deal with buying separate insurance coverage for every facet of their operation. They also are often cheaper than buying all your coverage a la carte. But the hassle-free, one-size-fits-all qualities of BOPs can become a problem if you aren't careful.
Typical BOPs cover buildings, equipment, business interruption and provide some protection in case your business is sued. That leaves fleet coverage, workers compensation, professional liability and health coverage to be purchased separately. And the coverage a typical BOP provides lacks the flexibility some companies need.
BOPs are designed with the "typical" small business in mind, but some small businesses are far from typical. Some industries are at a greater risk for litigation;, others might need more property coverage than is provided in a standard BOP. Companies that need coverage not included in a BOP either can buy their coverage separately or else can explore the possibility of buying add-on coverage in addition to their package.
Things to think about:
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If you have more than 50 employees you might be too big for a BOP.
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If your annual revenue is more than a few million dollars you might consider buying your coverage separately.
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Is your business overly dependent on one piece of machinery or especially vulnerable in one area? If so, you might want to get supplemental coverage.
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Is your business in an area vulnerable to earthquakes, hurricanes or floods? You'll need separate coverage for these hazards.
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Take a close look at the coverage offered in the BOP. Is it enough or would you feel better with a heftier policy?
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If you already have a package policy revisit it from time to time. Have you bought new equipment that might need more coverage? Have you hired more employees? When your circumstances change, your policy might need to as well.
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That parking lot fender bender could cost you a lot more than you bargained for. A study by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety found that most midsized cars suffer thousands of dollars in damage from crashes of less than 5 mph. A few suffered as much as $4,500 from a low-speed, front-end crash.
The problem is that modern car bumpers are no longer designed to protect the rest of the car from damage. "Many bumpers aren't high enough or tall enough to take the hit in crashes between cars and SUVs or pickups. Even when bumpers line up with those on other vehicles reasonably well, many don't stay engaged with the other bumpers in collisions or can't absorb the energy of even a minor bump. This means expensive car body parts sustain most of the damage," the study shows.
But it wasn't always this way. Until the early 1980s cars were required to have bumpers that resisted damage to the rest of the car in a low-speed crash. To emphasize this point, the institute put a 1981 Ford Escort though the same crash-tests as the modern cars. The lowest repair bill for a front-end crash in a modern car was the Mitsubishi Galant, which sustained $929 in damage. The Escort's repairs cost only $86.
The institute's president, Adrian Lund, said styling sometimes affects how much damage is sustained in a low-speed crash. He said minor changes in the slope and curve of a car can increase the damage in a fender bender by thousands of dollars. But Lund explains that automakers "don't have to sacrifice car style for function…. Engineers also could make bumper bars taller and extend them farther out to the corners of the car without changing the front-end styling."
Insurance claims for damage in these kinds of low-speed crashes total more than $6 billion each year, the report shows.
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| Supreme Court limits punitive damages |
The Supreme Court recently set new limits on the punitive damages levied against companies in lawsuits. And while it was a clear win for the business community, the court didn't go as far as many had hoped and left open the ultimate question of just how much juries can fine negligent companies.
The most recent case involved an Oregon man who died after smoking Philip Morris cigarettes. The jury found the company had falsely claimed the cigarettes were safe and awarded the man's estate $821,000 in compensatory damages and $79.5 million in punitive damages. Philip Morris appealed arguing that the punitive damages were "grossly excessive." In previous cases the court has held that excessive punitive damages are unconstitutional and has suggested that punitive damages more than nine times the compensatory damages were probably too much. Many had hoped the court would use the case to put a "hard cap" on just how much a jury can award in punitive damages, but that didn't happen. Instead, the court ruled on a the smaller matter of what the jury can consider when calculating punitive damages. In a 5-4 decision, they ruled that juries can't consider harm to those who are not part of the lawsuit, in this case, the millions of smokers who were not plaintiffs.
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| States reorder priorities |
When it came to insurance-related measures, state legislatures in 2006 once again focused primarily on workers compensation and motor vehicle insurance. But two new areas are beginning to get more attention, identity theft and catastrophe-related legislation, according to an annual survey by the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies.
Last year state legislatures from 10 states passed catastrophe-related laws, up from just three states in 2005. Much of the new attention came from lawmakers on the Gulf Coast, which was hit by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Louisiana alone passed five of the 17 new laws in 2006.
Identity theft continues to move up on the priority list of state lawmakers. In 2005 tort reform was the third most common insurance related issue to pass state legislatures, according to the survey. But in 2006 tort reform took a back seat to identity theft. Twenty-two states and the District of Columbia passed a total of 36 bills last year. Most of the new laws either required businesses to do more to protect a person's personal information, increased the responsibility of businesses to notify someone if their information had been accessed or increased the penalties for unauthorized use of that information.
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| Commercial auto insurance is vital |
Are you one of the many small-business owners who uses their personal vehicle for work? Is the pick-up truck you use to drive the kids to soccer practice the same one you use to pick up work supplies during the week? If it is and you insure that vehicle using a personal policy, you might be making an expensive mistake.
Commercial auto insurance is designed to provide coverage for business-related driving, while personal auto insurance isn't. In fact, many insurers ask you explicitly if you'll be using your vehicle for commercial reasons when you buy a personal policy. The last thing you want is to get into an accident with your personally insured vehicle while running an errand for work. Depending on the circumstances, your claim might even be denied if you're using a personally insured car for your business. Even if you only use your personal car for business a few times a month, it would be a good idea to check with your insurance representative to find out if you need to get a commercial policy. Some experts even advise home-business owners to get commercial insurance for their cars. Better safe, than sorry.
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| Most Katrina claims settled |
Responding to criticism about the way insurance companies have dealt with the damage caused by Hurricane Katrina, Dr. Robert Hartwig, president and chief economist of the Insurance Information Institute, testified before a House of Representatives subcommittee that nearly all of the 1.7 million claims totaling $40.6 billion have been settled.
Hartwig testified that fewer than 2 percent of insurance claims in Louisiana and Mississippi were in mediation or litigation. "Insurance companies strive to settle claims without any disputes with their customers. And the record is clear that in the overwhelming number of cases, that is exactly what happens. They are routinely settled by adjusters with policyholders at the scene without the involvement of attorneys or engineers in a courtroom," he stated.
He also used the opportunity to rail against added regulation of the insurance industry in states vulnerable to hurricanes. "States such as Florida have abandoned the fundamental concept of risk-based pricing, while in Mississippi the tort system has been used to require insurers to pay potentially hundreds of millions of dollars in flood losses - a type of loss for which they have never received a penny in premium," Dr. Hartwig said.
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| Business Briefs: La Niña on the way |
As the El Niño weather pattern begins to fade in the Pacific, federal climate scientists are warning that a potentially dangerous La Niña pattern is developing. A La Niña pattern is characterized by unusually cold water near the equator in the Pacific Ocean. What makes it so dangerous is La Niña's are generally associated with more hurricanes than normal in the Atlantic Ocean. "La Niña events sometimes follow on the heels of El Niño conditions," said Vernon Kousky, research meteorologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center. "It is a naturally occurring phenomenon that can last up to three years."
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| Business Briefs: NY workers comp overhaul |
New York state has agreed to overhaul its much-maligned workers compensation system. The governor and legislative leaders reached a compromise that is expected to cut costs by hundreds of millions of dollars a year while also raising benefits for injured workers for the first time in more than a decade. The savings will come by limiting the number of years some workers can collect money from the system and setting price controls on drugs and tests.
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