On July 9th, Healthesystems attended the Wisconsin Workers' Compensation Advisory Council (WCAC) meeting to receive updates on legislative and regulatory changes affecting the Department of Workforce Development (DWD).

Jim O’Malley, Director of Legal Services, shared the following key updates.

Senate Bill 45 was signed July 3rd, which requires the DWD to implement a hospital fee schedule by July 1, 2027. The schedule will cover five regions, with maximum fees set at 120% of the 75th percentile of in-network commercial rates in each region.

Wisconsin has previously not had a formal workers’ comp medical fee schedule, which has historically led to higher medical costs, and the introduction of a fee schedule marks a major policy shift that could lead to greater cost containment.

The Director also spoke about Assembly Bill 232, which currently sits with the governor. This bill would transfer all workers’ compensation dispute resolution functions from the Division of Hearings and Appeals (DHA) to the DWD, effective January 1, 2026.

A Rule Change to Section 80.72(2)(i), effective August 1, 2025, was also discussed, which would reduce the standard deviation used in determining reasonableness of fees during the dispute resolution process from 1.4 to 1.2, to align with statute s. 102.16(2)(d).

Two additional WCAC meetings are scheduled for August 26th and 27th.