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you all right good afternoon everybody thank you again for joining us for another virtual town hall with a Vermont Department of Labor I just want to thank you all again for joining us again my name is Kyle tweet I'm the communications and outreach coordinator for the department today's Thursday April 16 excited to have you all with us again as we have done this is our second one of this week our employer focused town halls we've done a few of these so far most of them have been focused on unemployment insurance which we know of course is a very hot topic amongst employers during this time but we also wanted to take some time to address some other topics which we will do going forward as we will today today will actually be talking employee safety and workers compensation amid coded 19 and we have a few distinguished folks with us to talk to you I didn't want to say we there are questions we can certainly address them at the end I would ask that they be focused on workers comp and worker safety of course and then anything else that may prompt you from what our presenters have this afternoon I will just kind of have a plug information on all of anything today can be found at labor Vermont gov the department's website as well as this broadcast will be recorded and can be accessed later both through this link as well as through our YouTube channel so we'll be uploading this to the department's YouTube channel so with that I'm just gonna I will introduce today's speakers we have Stephen Monaghan who's the director of work and workers compensation for the Department of Labor we have Kevin Gaffney who's the Deputy Commissioner for the department of financial regulation and Dan Whipple who is the program manager of OSHA the Occupational Safety and Health Administration so we that I am going to ask Steve Monahan to unmute is Mike and I just give a quick overview of we'll start with bozhe I just give it's just a general overview and then Steve and Dan kind of talk through the specifics of what is kind of going on amongst in the state across the board from a worker safety perspective so Steve you want to go ahead and unmute your mic and I'll send it over to you good afternoon Kyle said I'm Steve Monaghan director of the workers compensation and safety division at the Vermont Department of Labor bozhe remains active in this time Kovach 19 it is serving as the safety officer for the State Emergency Operations Center in addition it is conducting well responding to complaints filed by employees or requests for assistance by employers and is investigating reports of fatalities amputations are specific employee complaints Dan can provide you more detail on their operations but all staff although stations remotely at this time are responding in are conducting inspections as necessary although by and large were also acting in a compliance assistance mode why don't you take it from there later on right thanks T unmute my mic yeah so like I had said my name is Dan Whipple and I the program manager with bozhe and yeah so like Steve said we do have responsibilities at the Emergency Operations Center through those responsibilities we have been able to you know engage other agencies and answer questions you know play you know play the role of the safety officer and help guide folks both employers and employees to services of other agencies so it's been a really important role and as such we've been you know taking a lot of complaints from employees from our from our bozhe website a lot of the complaints deal with you know employers that either are allegedly operating outside of the governor's executive order or are not practicing appropriate protections for the Cova 19 virus and there there is I will say there is a lot of confusion among both employees and employers about what those need to look like and so we do have a pretty consistent mm guidance that we steer employers to from the Vermont Department of Health and from the CDC we've been using a lot of their language and guiding employers to protecting their workers and also guiding employees as to what proper protections look like because a lot of times we may get a complaint from employees when the employer is actually acting appropriately or appropriately under the CDC guidance and you know we we need to relay that as well so another thing that we've seen market increase of his retaliation complaints and so I you know I mentioned that just as a as a cautionary tale in this time of you know really high anxiety emotions run very high it's really important that employers and employees communicate and communicate in a way that is a positive communication when that doesn't happen for whatever reason employees have a right to file a complaint of retaliation and a lot of times those complaints are not valid and they come down to a communication issue between you know employees and their employers and so that's seeing that spike is not a terrible not not a not a huge surprise to us but I think in a lot of cases it relates to you know people that that may not get their message across and you know kind of build in their own sort of story or a plot line and all of a sudden it gets out of hand so I just put that out as a cautionary tale as well we've been handling our duty officer has been handling about twenty to forty calls a day between our duty officer our administrative assistant and it runs the gamut we always tell employers and employees if you have any questions be sure to you know get in touch with us call our 800 number I deal with employer at my level I deal a lot with employers who may know me from another association or presentation that I've done in the past and they might just email me or call me directly and and that's you know that's perfectly okay as well I think the big thing for me is for employers to follow the guidance depending on who you are and what you are as an employer as a essential employer make sure you follow the guidance from the CDC and from Vermont Department of Health and then communicate that guidance with your employees and as employees you know we want to see employees take responsibility for their safety and engage positively and proactively with that guidance if your employer provides you with ways to protect yourself engage that and that method and and keep yourself safe so that's kind of you know what we're doing we're still doing investigations of complaints referrals fatalities you know accidents that cause a you know hospitalization we still investigate all those so yeah so we're we're a pretty busy bunch of bunch of folks thanks Dan that's great we'll come back we'll circle back with some questions I think at the end I had a few questions about PPE so just kind of keep that on the top of your top of your head so the next I just want to kind of transition a little bit into some workers worker compensation questions Deputy Commissioner Kevin Gaffney will ask you to I'm going Mike as we can kind of start having a conversation about workers compensation rates in particular just from the department of financial regulations perspective so I'll let you go ahead and I'll let you go ahead thank you Chris Jericho so thank you for for the invite you know we through this and actually just historically workers compensation has a dual regulatory role between the department's of Labor who primarily does the execution of the benefits and the rules and the like and Department of financial regulation who where our role is to work on being the workers comp insurance and make sure that the insurance carriers are acting in appropriate manner and specific to kovat this is an issue that the department has recognized several weeks ago and as working through some solutions and you can you can forward the slide or do I do that do I have control nope I can put it up freakin thank you appreciate that and we've been we've recognized that businesses are affected in a number of different ways the large majority of businesses are either shuttered or they're repurposed and we recognize that while you're trying to deal with the financial stress of that many employers are also trying to access through the cares Act the the PPP funds that at the same time you still have your workers comp premiums - to deal with and so wanted to just talk about how workers comp was classified I think this would be this is probably pretty Elementary for most of you but just a level set obviously the premium is primarily based on the classification of your of your business currently and then it's multiplied by the rate that the particular job class comes with so if if you have fifty thousand in payroll and and a five-dollar rate then your workers comp premiums simplified of course is twenty five hundred dollars or five percent of your payroll now while workers are being paid to stay home and not do the actual work that they currently do we recognize that we have to come up with a solution and the way that works right now with workers comp is that you as the employer at the beginning of the policy period estimate what a role you will anticipate for the coming year so all of you had to do that when you renewed your policy you estimated X payroll you knew that perhaps your business was going to expand or contract so you did that estimate of prior year and and you you conducted that calculation what we've done is reached out to the advisory service organization so for workers comp the solution really has to start with and CCI the National Commission on compensation insurance they're the advisory service organization they kind of create the benchmark Christ they they basically filed the rates and our department approves those rates after a fourth of thorough review for the assigned risk market and for the voluntary market we review and approve the lost costs which are the basis for the ultimate premium that the voluntary market insurance carriers will so the the solution that we worked out with in CCI is to establish a separate class for those workers that are going to be paid to stay home under the state home stay safe order can now calculate a premium based on a furlough worker class and that furloughed worker class will actually bring with it a rate of zero so if for example that that you know let's say a $50,000 a year payroll and maybe ten of that now is actually going to be paid to the worker as a furloughed worker that that that payroll would have a rate of zero so you would only now be paying premium on the actual residual of the actual current class that you're in and the residual would be paid under a furlough toward a zero dollar cost so there's a couple of important things too for that we'll go through in the later slides but the other the other situation can be and we're seeing this now right we have restaurants that some are closed completely others are doing are kind of being repurposed in some other capacity almost like a deli now what they're doing curbside or delivery but they're not a full-on restaurant so there's some change in operations that may result from some of the current conditions and NCCI has rules in place to allow for those changes of classification there's also just service workers that may be a hundred percent teleworking that are under a an office classification that could actually be reclassified it's not as impactful because those rates are still are relatively low in the office environment but there is actually a Telo teleworking rate for those workers so you can go to the next slide so here's that here's an example of what what we're talking about you've got a manufacturing class that that's the class code 2361 it comes with a rate of just over four dollars per per 100 of payroll it's easy to just think of that as a percentage so it's really just over four percent of your payroll is the premium there's other components that come up with your ultimate premium but this is basically what drives the the lion's share of your premium amount and so in that example the forty thousand payroll if isn't if your individual employee is earning forty thousand that premium on that individual at this manufacturing class is over sixteen hundred dollars if for three of those months now they're furloughed then that's twelve thousand of that forty thousand annual payroll that is now under the furlough class so the residual is only twenty eight thousand so the actual premium for that for the workers comp for that individual for the course of the year would be the would be eleven hundred and forty five even though they threw the PPP program are still earning their full payroll but you as the employer are not being charged for an exposure it doesn't exist when they are furloughed so that's in that example you can see there there's a savings of nearly five hundred dollars what's important to make sure that so the reason we're giving this guidance now in advance of the rule being approved filed or approved that will happen late next week I'm hopeful that NCC I will have the the filing ready for us with this new class but what we wanted to do is take this opportunity and I thank labor for allowing me to participate in your Town Hall so signal to both the industry and to employers of what documentation you need to just have in place to take advantage of this change so there needs to be well-documented payroll records the rule when it is filed and improved will provide more details but I can tell you that the rule will account for any furloughed worker pay role going back to March 1st so so so there's there's definitely going to be an opportunity to account for all that payroll and then therefore having some modifications to your workers comp premium when those modifications happen will depend on where you are in the renewal cycle and I would say that the details of that really are important to talk through with your agent and/or your insurance company directly but secondarily Pat Murray whose serves a lot of different capacities at the department but has a lot of great experience in in the insurance division and she is going to be available at the department to respond to any questions or any concerns that you have or lack of clarity in terms of the guidance we're providing here and what is actually happening on the front line with you and your insurance agent insurance company the last point here is actually a broader about a link to the department's kovat 19 insurance guidance generally so on that page you'll see additional guidance for the commercial market generally for auto insurance so there's just a lot of different activities that we've been engaged in to help Vermont businesses and Vermont consumers generally so later on in the in the program I'll be available to answer any questions you have and I guess I'll hand it over to Steve now thank you very thank you Thank You Deputy Commissioner I appreciate it yeah it's a seize if you want to go ahead and jump in I'll turn we'll transition into your update from the Department of Labor's perspective yes thank you all for participating the Department of Labor workers compensation division continues to function most of my staff are now working remotely we have a few people who come into the office to take care of the mail and scan it to the appropriate workers comp specialists process the electronically filed first reports of injury and that type of thing we know that there are many questions and concerns falling around bolded 19 endemic and its impact on the workers compensation industry in general and it's not just about claims related to coded because endemic has resulted in workers and insurance companies having difficulty getting medical opinions accessing treatment accessing return to work services and things of that nature I can tell you that to date we've received close to 50 claims directly related to code that most of those involve health care facilities and we are working through those whether they'll be covered or not will depend on the specific facts in each case what we have done is one we are encouraging workers insurers and recommend you the use of telemedicine where it may be appropriate we have always permitted the use of telemedicine consistent with the Medicare guidelines for that service and our fee schedule actually has codes that would cover that I would also point out that the Department of Financial Regulation Kevin Gabi's organization as director insurers to cover telemedicine so that should not be an issue if it's appropriate and by way of example the state of Vermont which is self-insured for workers comp is working with concentra and their telemedicine services to try to address a lot of the less serious injuries that don't require in-person treatment so there are options out there for your workers by if they need assistance or if you have questions the department has also temporarily waived the requirement that a worker released with released to work with restrictions look for work because there's very little work out there at least 70,000 people applying for unemployment at the moment that would rather be be a rather futile exercise so we're not requiring that however if you are open and you have work that is consistent with any restrictions and that work can be performed safely in concurrence with postal regulations CDC and Health Department guidelines and you offer it to that worker we would expect that worker to take it and not be collecting full workers compensation it might be temporary partial or something of that nature we have provided guidance on how best to apply the rules relating to the denial of workers compensation claims and discontinuance of workers compensation claims given the difficulty getting medical evidence and that applies to both insurance companies in to injured workers so those bulletins are posted on the Department of Labor website you're interested they were sent out to all of the workers compensation insurance adjusters to the vocational rehabilitation providers and to the attorneys who represent employers and employees and workers compensation matters but they are posted on our website and you can find them there we also changed our rule to commit filing of some evidence electronically provided it doesn't exceed a certain number of megabytes because our system will be able to handle it file to large and there's a specific process for submitting that information securely spelled out in a memo and that's also posted on the Department of Labor website Kogan page so I know that employers have many questions and they wonder what their responsibilities are and of course sorry about that dog eat electronic eye the first responsibility is provide a safe and healthy workplace and if you're open I would say it's really important that you follow the CDC and Health Department guidelines that can prevent claims from arising to begin with second if you have claims reported to you it's important to report them to your insurer you get a first two protein profile that does not mean that you accept the claim doesn't mean that you approve of the claim it just allows the insurance company to begin their investigation especially at the start of the claim they have to ultimately the employee has to demonstrate that their issue is work-related but a delay will ultimately mean that in a insurer may have to start paying during its investigation rather than utilize the 21 days it has to investigate so it's important that you timely file it even if you have questions about whether it is work-related and I think I I'll stop there and we'll see what specific questions people have yeah that's great Thank You Stevie I appreciate it we'll just take it back over here so I think we have a few questions and I'll ask anybody who has any questions regarding workers compensation worker safety you know anything of that that like to post the questions on the right hand side in the chat but in the chat screen but have a few questions I would say either for Dan and for Steve I'm just regarding worker safety and PPE first one of the questions that came in was asking us to please discuss PPE and hygiene measures for essential employees in a non public work environment we have a small manufacturing and QA and QA team on site guidance has not been as bet as has been not very forthright at least for them it sounds like so I was and then Rhonda asks what are our obligations if we are able to still bring employees back as far as PPE working in a service area so I would say Dan if you want to maybe address that I know there's a lot around that that we're fielding and voters role if you want to talk a little bit about voters role when it comes to you know the guidance and everything but I know a lot of that kind of goes up the chain a little bit too you know a CCD and deep into the Department of Public Safety as well um yeah mics unmuted you know when we're working at home every day is take your dog to work day the other day I was on a Skype with an employer and my my one of my labs caught the neighbor kid spied the neighbor kid out raking alone and that was an interesting time anyways so to address the first question as far as the small manufacturing facility there is actual guidance out there and it's actually available on the OSHA website and there's a link on the Vermont Department of Labor website certainly as well but generally speaking as far as the guidance goes for these types of workplaces they don't have generally exposure to the public but they but there are some expectations and if they're deemed essential employers are directed to first of all provide sanitary type things like soap and water to wash your hands plenty of and sanitizer with at least 60% alcohol those types of things it's it's a strong recommendation now generally speaking across the board and I think in some neighboring states it's gonna need a little bit more than that but face masks are generally recommended for anyone who's gonna be out in the public now understand face face mask not not n95 face masks which are considered PPE but regular face masks like surgical masks and cloth masks are not seen as PPE but they are seen as an important tool to protect from the spread of a possible virus in that they're really good at trapping the vapor from your breath into the mask and thereby protecting those around you and of course if everybody's wearing a mask and everybody is going to be protected so I think we've seen evolvement of that opinion to the point where it is it is recommended across the board especially for you know industries that are public facing such as you know grocery stores hardware stores things like that to have your employees and in face mass now to and to get back to that original question so I think the guidance here would be making sure you practice social distancing making sure you have sanitary things soap and water readily available and also hand sanitizers wipes to be able to wipe down surfaces those are all requirements so those are not only guidelines with they're actually requirements and then under the guideline section certainly to the extent that there are operations that can't practice social distancing for whatever reason or for out however long really high recommendation of face masks to be used now this the second question so that's the first question the second question was when when employees start coming back what are the recommendations and that's really gonna I would say the recommendations today will probably be different than one then when employees start coming back when the stay at home orders start rolling out and they're gonna they're gonna look you know they're gonna look different than they are today as of today I would go back to my answer on the first question if employees have to be working they want to be you know you want to be protecting them social distancing sanitary you know ability to sanitize things hand sanitizers washing cleanliness that sort of thing face masks recommended for those employees that are going to be involved in very close contact such as health care workers you know emergency responders it looks like that then there is a requirement for PPE and and you know the base level where the base level of PPE would be recognized as n95 safety goggles face shields those kinds of things so where there's that requirement of course there's also other requirements of you know training and fit testing and things like that that go along with that so in answer to the second question I would say when when that comes when the governor starts to engage the economy again and people start going back to work make sure as a business manager you're paying attention to what the Vermont Department of Health is saying what the CDC guidelines are make sure if you have any questions that you contact us go to the Vermont Department of Labor website go to VOSA follow us on our 800 number we're more than happy to reach back out to you and provide any advice and assistance that we can so that's my answer for those two questions anyways hope I got them pretty well right no thanks Danny do you happen to know that 800 number off the top of your head or sure do long website quick yep sure do it's it's 802 eight seven two seven six five great I'm just gonna kind of keep continuing to scroll through and I know some questions and oh there was a question about the different kinds of masks and cloth mask and you already addressed that so I'm just going to kinda keep scrolling through the questions so Steve I think this one would be for you talking again but still talking about a central employer so we are an essential employer hardware store if an employee gets the virus how would we tell to happen or how do we tell if it happens through work your interaction with a customer or not if somehow the determination is that it was contracted through work with the employee / the employer but in a workers compensation claim before putting an employee out on s FCRA emergency pay so I guess if Steve if you kind of want to talk through the whole I know we've talked a little bit about it but just in terms of kind of how workers comp is being handled kind of amidst koban 19 from a claims perspective I know you kind of addressed a little bit earlier with in terms of a number of claims the department has received yes well the in a case in the case suggested there the employers obligation if if the employee contracts coded and tells the employer I believe I got this from contact while working at the store the employer should file that workers compensation claim the law says they should file reports of injury within 72 hours of learning of them our rule says file it with your insurance company and they turn around and file electronically with us that does not prevent in any way providing the employee resuming that once the employee is out they're either not coming in to work or or you're sending them home I that that does not prevent you from providing them with sick leave it's not any any amount paid who sick leave would be credited towards anything owed under workers compensation so the new if you're covered under the new federal law with the mandatory up to 80 hours of sick leave you have to pay that anyway but it won't mean you're paying twice the workers compensation insurance will not pay for any period that the sick leave is paid and ultimately it will be the individual workers obligation to prove where they contracted the virus what was more probable than not so that would be a detailed factual inquiry initially by an insurance adjuster wanting to know what where they were out of work there were contact with that kind of contact facing trying to pin that down as well as the likelihood that anyone at work either a door came into the facility with the virus and passed it on so ultimately it's a more likely than not test as to where they're clotted again if you're following CDC guidelines maintaining 16 your workers are wearing masks or have face shields or other types of protection the opportunity to catch it at work will be markedly reduced so that may be a factor in determining the likelihood of it occurring it work so when looking at the app Mon applies based on Supreme Court decision what's called this additional risk doctrine does your work place you in a much higher risk of getting injured or having contracting a disease then otherwise it might be the case there are certain occupations like certain health care in a hospital caring for Kovac patients where positional risks might make it more likely that you're contracting it there may be less so and other types of occupations with more limited contact with the public or with persons known to have covered 19 that's great thanks Steve just kind of continuing on that vein somebody asks asking a question about court about it's an employee comes into contact with a positive kovat positive individual while on the job and they go into quarantine but the employee them set within the scenario of the employee themselves would not test positive the person and the employer is just asking what workers compensation pay for a lost wages during quarantine I do just kind of want to make clear as well workers compensation would be one avenue of benefits there are other benefits including unemployment insurance and others that someone else may be eligible for Steve I'll ask you just to address the workers compensation part of that question they do say it's my understanding that the new federal sick leave benefit requirements which seems more lucrative than them would workers comp and that's kind of why I added that caveat if there are other relief efforts available right if if a person does not actually contract coded they would not be entitled to compensation although if there was a medical test there may be a medical bill that would have to be paid by the workers compensation insurer tested or a doctor's the doctor examined the patient and offered an opinion as to whether they had it or not that doctors bill might have to be done so if you if you think there was a likely exposure you may want to file the claim to protect yourself and your worker but if you're obligated to pay the sick leave benefit you should do so it's not in either or there won't be workers comp payment unless particularly indemnity benefits unless the individual he ultimately has kovat 19 and it it is more likely than not related so I think I'd be answering it ya know that that's perfect now which one is which one is more lucrative it's one they have an obligation to provide the sick leave benefit and and then filing the workers comp claim doesn't necessarily mean they will get any indemnity benefits alright I think there may be another in a similar vein yes they're not mutually exclusive filing a worker's comp claim is not mutually exclusive to receiving the signal advantage when if you remain employed and are getting sick leave the chances are if your employer is offering insurance that medical insurance covers more than just that individual it may cover their family and that's not necessarily continued if you're out on workers compensation so that alone might make it more valuable to take the sick leave benefit and remain on great addition back to dan real quick in terms of votre question questions coming in I'm not sure what the acronyms are Dan so I apologize our SDS required for disinfectants and sanitizer etc now that many employers are requiring infection control as a part of their job tasks new disinfectants need labels that meet hazardous communication standards pictograms etc I'm not sure you can address that Dan yes yes I can SDS is commonly known as safety data sheets right so so this may be one of those situations where I'll address the sheets themselves so this may be one of those situations where OSHA has an exemption for small quantities of consumable type products such as things like you know bleach wipes you know sanitizers things like that where it's you know if the employer buys a quantity that would be most generally purchased in a normal household then they generally would not need an SDS sheet for that particular chemical and usually the example that I give is if you buy a gallon of bleach you're probably not going to need an SDS for it if you buy a case of bleach you may you may want to so I think you know that would be that would be the threshold that I would use and the other thing too is if you're on the fence about it the SBS's are really really easy to get now you don't even and a lot of times you don't even have to go to the to the place where you bought it to get it you can just ge it offline you go to the to the manufacturers website and they'll have them posted readily available there so so that that's what I would say about the SDS is as far as the labeling goes you always need to label your containers so most of these containers that you're buying are going to be labeled sufficiently anyways most of them come in consumer containers that are sufficiently labeled most of the times you're not going to be taking from a bulk container and putting it into a smaller container but if that's the case if you buy say a gallon a hand sanitizer and you you know put it out into the workplace and smaller square containers you're gonna want to at least have a label on there that you know relates to the to the to the product that it is the product name the generally known name on the SDS sheet and at least the hazard of that product so it's an alcohol product you know the hazard might be that it's flammable or something like that so but for the most part if you're if you're buying a container and using it in that same container you don't have to worry about labeling districts great thanks thanks Dan for that just kind of moving forward I think this next one might be for a combination between Kevin and Steve deputy deputy commissioner Gaffney question is how is workers comp coverage adjusted for a company whose employees sorry I lost my spot its employees are also officers of the company the businesses closed due to code 19 their premium is based on minimum salary for their industry the payroll will not come close to the minimum salary how is the premium adjusted to closure of business I'm not sure Steve or Deputy Commissioner if you'd like to address that you know I can I can speak to the executive officer and actually it's it's more expanded than that now we effective for one we filed a rule to modify the minimum payroll it's called minimum R enumeration in the NCCI rules for not just executive officers and and partner owners but even sole proprietors so that minimum payroll now is instead of being the state average weekly wage is the state average weekly wage times 0.5 so 50% of the state average weekly wage so what used to be oftentimes a hurdle oftentimes the decision might have been to do a form 29 with the Department of Labor and an exclude exclude yourself from the system because of the minimum payroll requirement we decided on a lot of work that the workers comp task force which Steve is part of and other many others throughout state government are that we we wanted to alleviate that hurdle somewhat so that perhaps the decision would be to cover it oneself because the cost the cost hurdle was was lowered so I don't know if that answers that particular question now it sustained the same the same issue applies with the with the furlough status so if someone is is not actively engaged in that in their current role and their current business order or some something has changed in the way they do things those things can be modified if it's furloughed then that associated payroll would be at that zero rate that I talked about earlier and I don't know if I if I explained fully earlier but the rule will not be filed till later next week so there might be some additional details and guidance that we will update on that link that I had on the bottom of the last slide of the presentation that's great thank you just I think we have thought like one last question here before we wrap up I think you Deputy Commissioner I think you addressed remote workers so the question is just how does workers comp come into play with remote workers I think you would address it a little bit I'm and just kind of a kind of the rate adjustments but if you just kind of go back over that okay I think that's mine Kyle oh it is okay I'll let you go I happy to hear Kevin's thoughts on it but I think ultimately that would be my question remote workers if they're performing work for the business they are covered by workers compensation insurance but whether a claim is covered or not will depend on specific facts for example prior to this it was a worker's comp case where the employee of a company was working from home and a client of the company angry at the company went to that employees home and assaulted them and that because it was demonstrated then the anger and the reason for the assault was directly related to the employment that was covered if in a different circumstance the employee was working from home and had not maintained the steps into the office area where they worked at home and fell that might not be covered because that's a risk that could have happened whether the employee was actually working or not the employee would have to really demonstrate how it was related to work so there is coverage if they're working but and I would also point out if you're paying your employees during coded what they are not performing work then it's really not possible to have a work injury your work injury has to arrive out of and in the course of to work so if you're just sending them a check to keep them available when you are able to reopen they're not going to be able to establish that they have a workers compensation claim and what isn't until they're actually doing work benefitting you as the employer so remote work may be covered depending on the specific facts overall they are employees that must be covered under the policy either they have a successful claim or not I'll just I'll just add to that just from the classification side so in terms of the premium for that remote work if that's a change in the nature of the work they currently do under their current classification that could also result in an additional classification change and again that guidance is on our website the link I provided will actually provide a more robust document that I didn't want to cover today in this in this form but if anyone has any any questions they can reach out to Pat Murray great and again if people have questions encourage you to look at the Department of Labor's website or you can call a two eight two one three eight and that call will eventually get routed to me and I will respond to your question thank you that's great thank you for that answer so I think we have just about five minutes left I just kind of want to take some time to wrap up and thank each of you for for joining us today it looks like we've answered the majority of questions and topics that can't have come in so again Deputy Commissioner Steve and and Dan I appreciate you taking the time to join us this afternoon for this town hall your oh thank god so just again want to reiterate to folks as as we wrap up we do these town halls usually about twice a week and we'll continue to do them as the move through the the coded 19 process and pandemics certainly you know we found that it is a hopefully a benefit to you as employers and will continue to look into topics as well whether it's unemployment insurance as well as like this topic today was suggested so I wanted to provide that as an opportunity if you do have a topic suggestion please feel free to reach out whether it be through the department website or through through email as well you know it with suggested topics for this but again this broadcast was recorded and it'll be on the Department of Labor's website as well as on the YouTube channel so again thank you to our presenters for today and with that I will again just say you can go to labor Vermont gov for all updates and news labor Mozgov slash calendar for future town halls as they will be posted there and with that thank you everybody have a great rest of your Thursday and a great rest of your week thank you go thank you thanks you