Bill Text: HI HB1601 | 2020 | Regular Session | Introduced
Bill Title: Relating To Workers' Compensation.
Spectrum: Partisan Bill (Democrat 1-0)
Status: (Introduced - Dead) 2020-01-21 - Referred to LAB, FIN, referral sheet 1 [HB1601 Detail]
Download: Hawaii-2020-HB1601-Introduced.html
|
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES |
H.B. NO. |
1601 |
|
THIRTIETH LEGISLATURE, 2020 |
|
|
|
STATE OF HAWAII |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
||
|
|
||
A BILL FOR AN ACT
relating to workers' compensation.
BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF HAWAII:
SECTION 1. Section 386-51, Hawaii Revised Statutes, is amended to read as follows:
"§386-51
Computation of average weekly wages.
Average weekly wages shall be computed in a manner that the
resulting amount represents most fairly, in the light of the employee's
employment pattern and the duration of the employee's disability, the injured
employee's average weekly wages from all covered employment [at the time of
the personal injury]. In no event,
however, shall an employee's average weekly wages be computed to be less than
the employee's hourly rate of pay multiplied by thirty-five; provided that
where the employee holds part-time employment of fewer than thirty-five hours
per week, the employee's average weekly wages shall be the hourly rate at the
place of employment where the injury occurred multiplied by the average hours
worked in the fifty-two weeks (or portions thereof) preceding the week in which
the injury occurred, for the calculation of temporary partial disability and
temporary total disability benefits only.
Other benefits including permanent partial disability, permanent total
disability, and death shall be calculated as if the employee had been a
full-time employee.
(1) Where appropriate and feasible, computation shall be made on the basis of the injured employee's earnings from covered employment during the twelve months preceding the employee's personal injury; but if during that period, the employee, because of sickness or similar personal circumstances was unable to engage in employment for one or more weeks then the number of those weeks shall not be included in the computation of the average weekly wage.
(2) Where an employee at the time of the injury was employed at higher wages than during any other period of the preceding twelve months then the employee's average weekly wages shall be computed exclusively on the basis of the higher wages.
(3) Where, by reason of the shortness of the time during which the employee has been in the employment or the casual nature or terms of the employment, it is not feasible to compute the average weekly wages on the basis of the injured employee's own earnings from that employment, regard may be had to the average weekly wages which during the twelve months preceding the injury was being earned by an employee in comparable employment.
(4) Except as otherwise provided, the total average weekly wages of any employee shall be computed at a lower amount than the average weekly wages earned at the time of the injury by an employee in comparable employment engaged as a full-time employee on an annual basis in the type of employment in which the injury occurred.
(5) If an employee, while under twenty-five years of age, sustains a work injury causing permanent disability or death, the employee's average weekly wages shall be computed on the basis of the wages which the employee would have earned in the employee's employment had the employee been twenty-five years of age.
(6) The director may issue rules for the determination of the average weekly wages in particular classes of cases, consistent with the principles laid down in the first paragraph of this section."
SECTION 2. Statutory material to be repealed is bracketed and stricken.
SECTION 3. This Act shall take effect upon its approval.
|
INTRODUCED BY: |
_____________________________ |
|
|
|
Report Title:
Workers Compensation; Average Weekly Wages; Computation
Description:
Adjusts the method of calculating average weekly wages for workers' compensation claims.
The summary description
of legislation appearing on this page is for informational purposes only and is
not legislation or evidence of legislative intent.
