As gig workers become more prevalent, companies must increasingly consider — and often reconsider — all sorts of questions related to employing such individuals. Here are four of the most contentious: 1. Are gig workers actually gig workers? This may seem like an odd question, but before you can create policies around employing independent contractors, it’s important to recognize whether a worker is, indeed, an independent contractor. This issue is currently being debated most prominently in California, as gig-economy companies wrestle with the state’s AB5 law, which has redefined the definition of an independent contractor.

CHICAGO, Oct. 6, 2020 – Aclaimant, an insight driven workflow solution for safety and risk management, today announces Andrew Pinkes has joined the company's advisory board. Pinkes brings 30 years of experience in the insurance industry, and his expertise in legal and litigation management, medical management, large loss claim handling, quality program design, third-party administrator (TPA) oversight, and vendor management will benefit Aclaimant and its board.

The pandemic has caused massive changes to how companies utilize talent. With talent being key to organizational success and independent contractors being critical to the talent portfolio, now is the time to identify prominent emerging trends and consider how they impact the risks of utilizing ICs. The new social backlash. Many people believe that organizations are cheating entire groups of workers out of the protections such as unemployment compensation, workers’ compensation, paid time off, and protection against employment discrimination, and social media facilitates the identification and punishment of alleged perpetrators. The consequences could be severe for those accused of exploiting workers through IC schemes.

Aclaimant has received acquisition interest from both private equity and strategics, but prefers to remain independent in a dynamic insurance and risk management space, said co-founder and CEO David Wald. The Chicago-based risk management platform has received interest from suitors for about the last five years, although it did not receive such interest while it was raising a USD 10m Series A, which it announced on 29 June, said Wald. The company had a clearly stated goal of raising money after a strong 2019 and was not for sale, said Wald.

As even more employees return to work, staff safety is top of mind for every business – and has been for some time within the hospitality industry. Virginia recently adopted the country’s first set of coronavirus-related workplace safety mandates, requiring businesses to implement safety measures to protect people from being infected with the coronavirus at work.   To find out how Virginia’s new safety mandates might impact other states with the U.S.A., HT spoke with Gary Pearce, chief risk architect at Aclaimant, an insight-driven workflow solution for safety and risk management.  

Businesses reopening after the COVID-19 shutdowns are returning to a vastly different environment than what they were used to. Aside from the well-known risks such as health protocols to avoid the spread of disease, they will have to contend with other risks that may not be as obvious. Gary Pearce, Chief Risk Architect at Aclaimant, identified three categories of risk that businesses must be aware of as they begin operating again. The first category, he said, are less-evident sources of high-cost litigation, including litigation with the potential to become a class action.

For many, the past few months of coronavirus response have felt like years. Most people can’t recall a period when they were forced to embrace a radical shift in mindset so quickly. One of the strangest parts of this experience is that most people, outside of the essential workforce, have experienced this in a pseudo-isolated environment. Sheltered in homes or restricted to minimal travel from home to work, the collective level of interaction with the outside world has effectively been cut off.

There’s no shortage of businesses worldwide that are struggling to survive the coronavirus pandemic. But insurance organizations and vendors that fostered a digital-first business model before this year’s public health and economic crisis may now find themselves in a position for growth. Such are the aspirations at Aclaimant, the Chicago-based makers of an insight-driven workflow solution for safety and risk management that recently secured a fresh round of investor funding to scale up its business. Here, Aclaimant CEO and Co-Founder David Wald talks about how his company plans to engage insurance brokers, who are now under increased pressure to provide clients with innovative risk-mitigation data insights that ultimately drive down insurance costs.

Businesses planning for COVID-19-related reopenings must deal with numerous employee and workplace risk factors, as well as regulatory guidance that seems to evolve on a weekly, if not daily, basis. The stakes are higher than ever, and employers have no choice but to get it right the first time. Here are some ways to identify and protect the at-risk worker, as well as the general public and your own organization, while staying within legal and regulatory guidelines.