Tennessee Workers Comp - New Law for Contractors

Watch out when the government gets excited and tries to fix a problem! That's what's going on in the Tennessee Workers Compensation arena with a new law that was designed to level out the contractor playing field. This new law...to go into effect December 31, 2009, requires a sole proprietor to carry workers comp insurance. This law was originally intended to address the problem of workers comp stacking, where an employer would declare that their staff was in fact individual sole proprietors and fell outside the law requiring workers comp coverage be provided for all employees. In fact a poor attempt practiced by some contractors and used to skirt around the workers comp requirements that an employer provide coverage for their employees.

It's estimated that in this case the new law would force around 10,000 contractors to purchase workers compensation insurance! Wow! This couldn't have come at a worst time! Many of the small single owner operator contractors would be forced to purchase a policy potentially costing thousands of dollars!

So the good news....Tennessee State Lawmakers are reviewing the law trying to find a way to reduce the negative effect. However, this may take some time to work its way out and in the mean time December 31, 2009 is ticking closer and closer!

So if you are a contractor in the State of Tennessee, make sure you are compliant with the new state workers comp law!