Florida Workers' Compensation Insurance

Corporate officers and LLC members generally count toward the employee threshold in both construction and non-construction industries, and are covered by default. Eligible corporate officers and LLC members can apply for a formal exemption from the Division so they are excluded from a policy for their own work, though construction-industry exemptions have additional restrictions and a lower cap on how many officers/members can hold them at once. Sole proprietors and partners in non-construction fields aren't automatically counted as employees or covered, and must file Form DWC-251 to elect coverage for themselves if desired.

Operating without required coverage typically results in a Stop-Work Order that halts all business operations until the employer complies and pays a penalty, with the penalty calculated as two times the manual premium the employer would have paid during the preceding 12- or 24-month period. A Stop-Work Order can also be issued for understating or concealing payroll, misrepresenting employee duties, or trying to avoid proper premium. Beyond civil penalties, Florida treats certain violations as criminal acts, including false statements to obtain coverage, failing to report injuries, discharging an employee for filing a claim, deducting premium from employee pay, and misclassifying workers as independent contractors.

Florida is a competitive market state rated by NCCI, so our agency can compare coverage across the many private carriers writing business here. There is no Florida state-run workers' comp fund; employers who can't find a voluntary carrier are placed through the NCCI-administered assigned risk plan. Because Florida's threshold is different for construction (one employee) versus non-construction (four employees) businesses, and because owner-officer exemption rules also differ by industry, it's worth confirming which set of rules applies with an agent, especially for a business that does both types of work.