Nebraska Department of Insurance

NEBRASKA DEPARTMENT OF INSURANCE INSURANCE FRAUD PREVENTION DIVISION 941 O Street, Suite 400 Lincoln, NE 68508-3639

Lost Earnings or Wage Fraud Hints

It is important to remember that the hints listed below are merely possible "red flags" that there may be some evidence consistent with an insurance fraud scheme.  Any one or two of these by themselves, may not raise your suspicion; however, when you have several of these hints present or a pattern begins to emerge, you should investigate further or forward your suspicion to the Insurance Fraud Prevention Division.

1. Efforts to verify lost earnings statement with employer raise doubts about employer legitimacy or about the actual employment of the claimant.
2. Employment began shortly before the date of the accident.
3. The claimant is self-employed.
4. The claimant's declared income level is incompatible with the claimant's standard of living.
5. Employment information is provided for a small or unknown business.
6. Other sources of claimant's income are not documented.
7. Tax returns are not provided by claimant.
8. The claimant did not file tax returns.
9. The business address is a post office box, mail drop, or residential area.
10. The business telephone is answered by an answering machine or service.
11. The claimant is only available via a pager/beeper.
12. The employer cannot provide the claimant's most recent W-2 (Form 1099).
13. The employer cannot provide claimant's FICA statement for the last fiscal quarter.
14. Wage documentation is handwritten or typed on blank sheet of paper (no letterhead), or has inferior quality business letterhead.
15. Wage documentation is provided in a form letter.
16. Wage documentation is provided by claimant's attorney.
17. Wage documentation has alterations or erasures.
18. Wage documentation is not centered on the page and/or has misspellings, grammatical errors, etc.
19. Wage documentation dates include weekends, holidays, plant closures, etc.
20. Verifying employee / manager / supervisor is no longer employed or is not known at the business.
21. The business cannot provide time cards and/or sheets or other documents verifying days, hours, wages.
22. Employee cannot provide wage check stubs from previous weeks for wage statement.
23. One or more elements of the lost wage statement is questionable, such as, length of absence, length or date of employment, rat of pay, income, number of days/hours worked in a week.
24. Affidavit submitted for future potential wages rather than lost wage statement of actual Wages and verification of previous income just prior to accident.