Press Release
Acclaim Otago

23.6.12

ACC KPIs need to measure actual return to sustainable work

There has been a lot of discussion about whether ACC staff should get performance based pay for getting people back to work. We believe this misses the point for two reasons: (1) back to work is 30hours per week at the minimum wage; and (2) what is measured is an assessment of capacity to work, not actual sustainable work.

Take for example a person who was injured whilst receiving the average weekly wage of $800 per week. They would be entitled to $640 per week of earnings related compensation for lost earning. When they are assessed by an ACC assessor as being able to work 30 hours per week at a minimum wage job ($390 per week), their weekly compensation stops. Therefore, even if the person can work 30 hours per week at the minimum wage, their income will be less than half that of when they were injured.

The second problem, relates to the fact that the performance being measured is not “getting the person back into sustainable work”. Instead, it is getting the person assessed by one of a handful assessors chosen by ACC, as being 'capable' of working 30 hours per week in any job.

The system needs to be better designed to incentivise and measure actual return to work and ensure that everyone does what they can, rather than have a dysfunctional tap that turns on and off at 30 hours per week.

ENDS

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