Commission Currents

October @ VWC

A NOTE FROM SENIOR LEADERSHIP

Hello Team VWC! The October Commission Currents highlights four new VWC Team Members - additions to the Judicial and the Virginia Victims Fund teams, two Citizenship Award recipients, updates from our Affinity Groups, departments and a special spotlight from our Virginia Beach Regional Office. This edition of the Commission Currents also includes wonderful fall photos and moments captured by various VWC Team Members. Thank you all for your submissions and for another successful month at VWC!

Please take some time to learn about October at VWC.

#weworkasone

--Evelyn V. McGill

COMMISSION MEETING SPOTLIGHT

During the two October Commission Meetings, the Commission approved the following items:

• Emergency Disaster Relief Policy
  
• ARMICS Report for submission to the Department of Accounts
  
• Various Self-Insurance items
  
• MFS Actuarial Services Contract
  
• 20-Day Payments Made
  
• Supplemental Agreement Form
  
• Approval of a 2% Salary Increase and Pay Band Adjustments
  

The Project Management Office (PMO) presented a department spotlight which highlighted their team,

major projects and goals.

The Information Systems Department (IS) provided a spotlight highlighting all six teams in IS and their job duties.

The Financial Services Department (FSD) presented the 2023 Financial Update and Spotlight, which included:

• Planning the 2024 Budget
  
• Managing Self-Insurance WebFile
  
• Processing all financial transactions
  
• Building security and maintenance updates
  

The Virginia Victims Fund Department (VVF) provided a spotlight highlighting the unclaimed restitution process and comparison stats with other victim agencies.

Anyone Can Attend a Commission Meeting

Commission Meetings are open to the public and are being held virtually via WebEx. Any Team Member that is interested in attending the Commission Meeting, should contact Jerry Jones, Administrative Assistant to the Executive Director, here.

VWC Admin Updates

The Budget Committee continued its review of the 2024 budget requests from each department.

The Strategic Direction Initiative Committee continued its work on designing the path forward for VWC’s future. The Committee has briefed the Commission, Leadership Team and VWC Team Members on the initiative, developed a SWOT process for all departments to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats and shared the Top Workplace Survey results with all department heads for discussion with their teams.

Evelyn V. McGill, Executive Director, was interviewed for a Top Workplace cover story on VWC for Energage’s website. The story will discuss VWC’s Top Workplace journey and how it has been successful in achieving this award for the past three years.

Plans are underway for the SAWCA All Committee Conference, with VWC representatives leading several committees including the Administration/Procedures Committee (Evelyn McGill, Executive Director) and the Data Analytics Committee (Paul Baitinger, Chief Information Officer).

Fall Festivies at VWC

NEW TEAM MEMBERS

Welcome to VWC!

#weworkasone

Doniece Flax

JUD - HQ

Judicial Compliance Technician

Trina White

JUD - HQ

Brittany Terry

VVF

Darla Yoder

JUD - HQ

Judicial Assistant to Deputy Commissioner Roach

Claims Examiner

Judicial Assistant to Deputy Commissioner Hunter

Fun

Facts

Team Member Resources

TEAM MEMBER HIGHLIGHTS

Jessica Buchanan

VVF

Mass Casualty Senior Claims Coordinator

On October 10, Jessica Buchanan was promoted to Mass Casualty Senior Claims Coordinator in the VVF Department.

Devon Doyle

EDI

EDI Technical Specialist

On October 25, Devon Doyle was promoted to EDI Technical Specialist in the EDI Department.

Recent Departures

No recent departures.

AWARDS AND RECOGNITION

Alex Richards, August recipient

Nominated by Jessica Buchanan, Mass Casualty Senior Claims Coordinator

“Alexcie (Alex) is a super asset to the VVF team! Alex is more than willing to help her co‐workers in any of her areas of expertise! Due to the claims backlog, Alex has merged her knowledge of medical providers with claims processing and has taken the initiative to help processing claims! Alex always goes the extra mile for VVF and the victims that we serve. Alex works hard to create relationships and contact with medical providers to ensure that the Examiners are able to receive the documentation needed to issue an award. If the provider sends that documentation to Alex, instead of just dropping it into the claim, Alex places it in the claim, associates the documents to the expenses, and completes all of the expense calculations for the examiner so all they have to do is issue the award decision. This is a HUGE help to the examiners and cuts down on the examination processing time when Alex is able to go this extra mile to help out. Any time examiners have an issue obtaining information, Alex is eager to help. She is the first one to call a providers office to see what we can do to get the documentation faster. She then creates a relationship with that provider, ultimately leading to our office being able to receive these documents faster in the future. If Alex is ever unsure of something that may affect the work of someone else, she reaches out to be sure that what she is doing is best for the team. She does this when completing calculations on claims to make sure it wont mess anyone up or confuse anything. Alex is always looking for innovative ways to help our team be successful and work towards leading the nation with victim services.”

-Jessica Buchanan, Mass Casualty Senior Claims Coordinator

Alex Richards

VVF

Medical Services Liaison

Rosa Roche, September recipient

Nominated by Lynne Ferris, Deputy Commissioner - VA Beach

“I nominate Rosa Roche for her quick response to the medical emergency that occurred in our courtroom on September 7, 2023. Rosa called 911 and, when there was a technical problem with the call going through from the courtroom phone, took immediate action to ensure the call went through from another phone. Rosa remained in the courtroom until the ambulance crew arrived. I appreciate Rosa's quick action and level head during this medical emergency. She is an asset to the Commission and the people we serve.”

-Lynne Ferris, Deputy Commissioner - VA Beach Regional Office

Rosa Roche

JUD - VA Beach

Evidentiary Hearing Clerk

VWC Special Announcements

Wish your Team Members a happy birthday!

VWC AFFINITY GROUPS

You can be a part of various committees within VWC. Click on the groups below to see what's new.

VWC Department Highlights

DID YOU KNOW

#weworkasone

VWC Mediators received 4 hours of CME credit at the VWC Educational Conference & Exhibition on October 18th and 19th. Deputy Commissioner Linda Gillen and Staff Attorney Lauren Hill presented “Mediation for Adjusters” at the Conference.

All of the Commission’s mediators who were up for recertification with the Supreme Court of Virginia were recertified prior to the October 31 deadline.

The Supplemental Agreement Form - Varying Wage Benefits was approved for immediate use by the Commission on October 31. The form is now available on VWC's website. Key features of the form include:

• Eight distinct periods of temporary partial disability benefits
  
• Four distinct periods of temporary total disability benefits
  
• An ending date for periods of temporary total disability
  
• A signature line to allow attorneys to sign on behalf of their client
  
• An example of how to calculate temporary partial disability benefits
  
• A direct link to the Commission’s calculator tool
  

To access the form, click here.

On October 18th and 19th, the Commission successfully hosted its annual VWC Educational Conference and Exhibition, featuring the 2nd annual VVF Symposium and the inaugural MFS Symposium at the Greater Richmond Convention Center. With a record turnout of 561 attendees, the event showcased a rich diversity of topics, providing valuable insights for various stakeholder groups. Beyond the professional exchange, the event took on a charitable dimension, as it actively contributed to raising scholarship funds for Kids’ Chance of Virginia. To view highlights, please click here to see photos from this year's educational event. The dates for our 2024 conference are October 8th and 9th.

Additionally, on October 1, the Virginia Victims Fund published its 2023 Annual Report, a project rebranded and developed with the assistance of the OSD Team. Correspondence Management collaborated with various departments throughout the Commission to facilitate the processing and mailing of over 10,000 COLA letters, slated for distribution to claimants in November. The specialists in the Customer Contact Center handled over 3,700 calls, and we are pleased to recognize Missy Estep, Customer Contact Center Specialist, as the October Specialist of the Month.

EDI Quality Assurance gets a lot of tasks from Team Members outside our department. Over the years, we have received questions as to which tasks should be sent for different scenarios. In order to help everyone understand the different task types worked by EDI QA, we want to provide you an overview of each one.

This month we will provide you information on the different task types worked by EDI QA’s Technical Team. Next month we will focus on those tasks worked by our Compliance Team.

• Consolidation Request: When a Casper user notices that two or more JCNs exist for the same injury, a Consolidation Request task is sent to our Technical Team. We will review all the JCNs in question and determine if a consolidation is needed.
  

• Consolidate Request-Cancelation Received: When a Claim Administrator submits a cancelation transaction via EDI, a task is triggered so that our Technical Team can review the JCN and determine if a consolidation or deactivation is needed.
  

• EDI Exception Review: When an EDI transaction is submitted by a Claim Administrator and received by the Commission, our system checks for different things within the transaction to determine accuracy. If issues are found, the transaction is flagged and an EDI Exception Review tasks is generated alerting our Technical Team that the transaction needs to be reviewed before it is ingested into Casper.
  

• Variance: When there is a discrepancy between the amount of compensation awarded and the amount paid, this task is triggered and reviewed by our Technical team to determine if a Variance Letter should be sent to the claimant letting them know an underpayment may exist.
  

• Review Expired Call-ups: EDI QA sets a lot of call-ups for various things. Just like with all other call-ups set by other departments, when a call-up expires for an EDI QA process, a Review Expired Call-up is triggered and later reviewed to determine next steps. We have call-up tasks for Claimant Address Review, EDI Compliance Review, EDI Exception, EDI Info Needed and Other.
  

VWC Regional Office Highlights

Virginia Beach Regional Areas

Updates from Virginia Beach

Virginia Beach—where the Chesapeake Bay meets the Atlantic Ocean! This year marks the 60th Anniversary of the strategic merger of Princess Anne County and Virginia Beach into what is the metropolitan Virginia Beach of today.

Fun facts about Virginia Beach:

1) The largest city in Virginia with a population of over 457,000 and almost 500 square miles in size;

2) Serves as home to four military bases;

3) Has the longest pleasure beach (38 miles of shoreline) on the planet according to Guinness World Records;

4) Home to Mount Trashmore, the nation’s first landfill park made from a 640,000-ton pile of garbage;

5) Home to the Cape Henry Lighthouse, the first construction project authorized by the newly formed United States.

The Virginia Beach Regional Office is located in Virginia Beach’s Central Business District, near Town Center, a 36-acre mixed use lifestyle center, which features shopping, entertainment and over 25 restaurants. We are located on the third floor of the Pembroke 1 Office Building, which was renovated in 2018 with 2 courtrooms and expanded mediation and attorney meeting room spaces. Our office is responsible for conducting hearings in Virginia Beach, Hampton, Franklin and Eastville.

In the last year, Linda Updegraff, who served as a Commission employee for over 32 years, retired as Deputy Commissioner Terry Jenkins Judicial Assistant. Following Linda’s retirement, Rhian Senseman joined our team. Also, Pat Rudolph, who is currently Deputy Commissioner Lynne Ferris Judicial Assistant, plans to retire this December with 26 years and 9 months of service to the Commission.

Our team currently consists of Deputy Commissioner Lee Wilder; Deputy Commissioner Lynne Ferris; Deputy Commissioner Terry Jenkins; Arleen Painter, Judicial Assistant to Deputy Commissioner Wilder; Pat Rudolph, Judicial Assistant to Deputy Commissioner Ferris; Rhian Senseman, Judicial Assistant to Deputy Commissioner Jenkins; Chanee Diggs, Senior Receptionist; Valerie Leydet, Evidentiary Hearing Clerk; and Rosa Roche, Evidentiary Hearing Clerk. Also, Chief Deputy Commissioner James Szablewicz assists our office by providing coverage for the Eastville hearing docket.

VWC LATEST JOB POSTINGS

Please see below for open positions and closing dates for current VWC job postings:

VWC TRAINING OPPORTUNITIES

The DCJS Active Shooter “Civilian Response & Casualty Care” training that was presented and recorded at the Richmond HQ earlier this fall is now available in the Virginia Learning Center.

The training is approximately three hours and forty-five minutes. For ease of viewing (and to help keep your progress), the recording has been broken down into eight parts. To complete the training, all eight parts must be accessed and viewed.

Everyone is required to complete this training. Those who attended in person do not need to view the recording and will not be assigned the training.

Regional Office Team Members and those in Richmond who could not attend the in-person sessions will be assigned the training with a 60-day deadline.

SUGGESTION BOX Q&A

All suggestions submitted during the month of October will be reviewed and answered in the next issue of the Commission Currents.

Have something to submit? Submit your question/suggestion to the Suggestion Box, here.

Want to catch up? Check out past newsletters here.