Experience rating (WCB)

A workers' compensation program that raises or lowers your premium rate based on your own claim costs compared with similar employers.

Also called: WCB experience rating, merit rebates and surcharges, experience-rated premiums, PRIME

What experience rating (WCB) means

Experience rating is how a workers' compensation board adjusts your premium rate to reflect your own safety record. Every employer starts with the base rate for its industry. If your claim costs over a set period are lower than expected for businesses like yours, you may get a discount or refund. If they are higher, you may pay a surcharge.

The idea is to reward employers who prevent injuries and get injured workers back to work quickly, and to make those with costly claims pay more of the cost. For small employers, the effect is often limited, because one claim says little about the safety of a small business. Many boards scale the adjustment by business size or only rate employers above a certain premium level.

Experience rating means a single claim can affect your premiums for several years, not just the year it happens.

How it works

Boards look back over a window of years, usually 3 (6 in Ontario), and compare your claim costs with what would be expected for your industry and payroll. The difference becomes a percentage discount or surcharge, often scaled by a participation or credibility factor based on your size, and capped at a maximum.

What drives your costs is mostly how long workers are off. A short claim with only health care costs adds little. A claim where the worker is off for months adds much more. That is why early, safe return to work, through suitable modified duties, is one of the main ways to control experience rating costs.

Read your statements. Most boards send a yearly experience rating statement or show it in your online account. Check that every claim listed is yours, that costs look right, and that claims you appealed show correctly. Errors happen.

Common mistakes: discouraging workers from reporting injuries to protect a discount, paying injured workers off the books, and ignoring modified work options. Boards treat claim suppression seriously; prevention and early return to work are the legitimate ways to improve your rating.

Experience rating (WCB) by province

Each board runs its own program, with different look-back periods, size rules and limits. These are the published limits we confirmed.

Where the work is done	The rule
British Columbia	Compares your last 3 years of claim costs per payroll dollar with your rate group. Over time you can earn up to a 50% discount or a 100% surcharge.
Alberta	Employers with $15,000 or more of industry-rated premiums over 3 years are experience rated, capped at a 40% surcharge. Smaller employers get only a 5% surcharge after 5 or more lost-time claims.
Ontario	The WSIB sets your rate from up to 6 years of claim costs against your class, weighted by size. Rates move up to 3 risk bands a year toward your projected rate.
New Brunswick	Applies if your average annual assessment is $2,000 or more. Your rate moves 1% for every 2.5% your costs differ from your group, up to a 40% rebate or 80% increase, scaled by participation level.
Nova Scotia	Uses your last 3 years of claim costs against your industry. Adjustments range from 10% down to 20% up for small employers, and 30% down to 60% up for large ones.
Prince Edward Island	Since 2022 every employer is in the program, with changes to limit the effect on small employers. The latest published limits are a 25% discount and a 50% surcharge.
Newfoundland and Labrador	PRIME compares your claim costs over a 3-year base period with an expected range. The last published limits were a 20% refund and a 40% charge.

We did not confirm current program details for Quebec, Manitoba, Saskatchewan or the territories.

Example: Two years after a long claim

Fatima runs a 20-person commercial bakery in Calgary. Her 3-year industry-rated premiums are well over $15,000, so WCB Alberta experience rates her account. In 2025, a baker hurt his shoulder and was off for four months with no modified work offered.

That claim cost stays in her 3-year window, and her rate now carries a surcharge. Fatima sets up a modified duties list (packaging, labelling, inventory counts) so future injured workers can return sooner, and reviews her experience rating statement each year to check every claim on it.

Free WCB calculators

Staffkin's free WCB claim cost calculator estimates how one claim could change your premiums over the next 3 rate years under your board's experience rating rules.

Estimate your WCB premium

Free tools and guides for this

Questions about experience rating (WCB)

Does one WCB claim raise my premium?

It can, if your board experience rates your business. The effect depends on the claim's cost, your size and your board's limits, and it can last for several years.

Are small businesses experience rated?

Sometimes. Some boards rate only employers above a premium threshold, such as $15,000 over 3 years in Alberta or a $2,000 average annual assessment in New Brunswick.

How can I lower my experience rating surcharge?

Prevent injuries, report claims accurately, and offer suitable modified duties so injured workers can return to work sooner.

Official sources

General information for Canadian employers, not legal advice. Rules differ by province and territory and change over time, so check with your provincial employment standards office (or the federal Labour Program if you are federally regulated) before you rely on it. See employment standards by province.

Checked against official sources on 4 November 2026.