Threshold Dx 42
42-Day Forensic Readiness Diagnostic
Your HR team will tell you they are ready for 1 July. The question is whether their confidence is based on a forensic assessment of your documentation and processes, or on the assumption that existing policies are sufficient.
Threshold Dx 42 answers that question with evidence, not opinion.
What Changes in NSW on 1 July 2026
From 1 July 2026, in NSW, insurers have 42 calendar days to determine liability for conduct-based psychological injury claims. This includes claims arising from bullying, harassment, and excessive work demands. If a determination is not made within 42 days, the claim is deemed accepted.
Deemed acceptance does not just accept the claim. It accepts that the employer's actions were not reasonable management action taken in a reasonable way. That is not a claims decision. It is a governance verdict delivered by default.
The reforms also introduce mutual obligations on employers to assist insurers in gathering the information needed to make a determination. If your internal system cannot produce a forensically complete file within the timeframe that allows the insurer to act, your system is structurally guaranteeing deemed acceptance.
Why 42 Days Is Not Enough for Most Employers
Consider the typical sequence when a workplace complaint leads to a psychological injury claim in a mid-sized organisation:
That sequence takes 50 to 60 days in a well-functioning organisation. The statutory window is 42. By the time most employers have engaged an investigator, the clock has already consumed half the available time.
Not Every Claim Needs an Investigation
If the claim relates to performance management, organisational change, workload decisions, or other management processes, the employer does not need a factual investigation to defend it. The Section 11A reasonable management action defence rests entirely on documentation. Was the worker informed of the concerns? Were they given the opportunity to respond? Was a support person offered? Were outcomes communicated in writing? Did the worker receive a copy of every document the employer relied upon?
If the answer to all of these is yes, and the documentation is contemporaneous with verifiable dates and the worker's acknowledgement, the defence is self-evident from the file. The insurer can assess it immediately. No investigation required. No delay. No deemed acceptance risk.
If the answer to any of these is no, the employer is paying for an investigation they should not need, consuming time they do not have, and creating deemed acceptance risk that their own documentation should have prevented.
The Premium Freeze Is Not Protection
The premium target collection rate is frozen until 30 June 2028. But individual employer premiums can still increase based on claims experience. Deemed acceptances are claims experience.
Under the new excess arrangements, employers pay a fixed excess of up to two weeks of income support on every claim, capped at the statutory maximum weekly compensation amount of approximately AU$2,605 per week. That is up to approximately AU$5,210 in direct cash cost per claim before any insured cost flows through.
When the freeze lifts in 2028, employers who have accumulated deemed acceptances will face a compounded premium correction. The freeze does not prevent the financial consequence. It delays and concentrates it.
Why HR's Reassurance Is Not Enough
HR teams believe they are compliant because they have policies. But having a process and having a process that produces forensically defensible evidence within 42 days are completely different things.
HR measures its own system against whether the process was followed. The tribunal measures the employer against whether the process was experienced as fair by the worker and whether the documentation survives adversarial challenge. HR has never been asked to assess their system against that standard. The people who designed the process are not the right people to test whether it works.
Threshold Dx 42 bypasses self-assessment entirely. We take your actual documents and test them against the actual standard. The result is objective.
Your Insurer Will Not Save You
When an insurer receives a weak file from an employer, the insurer has a choice: make a determination they cannot defend, or let the 42-day clock run and accept deemed acceptance. Most insurers will choose deemed acceptance over making a determination on insufficient evidence, because a bad determination creates regulatory risk for the insurer.
The employer who provides a weak file is not just risking a slow process. They are giving the insurer a reason to let the clock expire.
What Threshold Dx 42 Does
We run a simulated conduct-based psychological injury claim against your current policies, procedures, documentation, and response capability. We treat it as if a claim has been lodged today and ask: can your system produce a defensible determination within 42 days?
The diagnostic examines three layers:
Process Architecture
We map your internal timeline from complaint notification to insurer submission, day by day, against the 42-day statutory window. We identify every point where your process exceeds the limit and how many days are lost at each failure point.
Evidence Integrity
We audit your investigation documentation, performance management records, meeting protocols, and complaint handling procedures against the evidentiary standard required for a reasonable management action defence. We assess whether your records are contemporaneously created, signed by all parties, provided to the worker at each stage, and supported by independent verification of timing. We test whether they would survive a fabrication challenge on timing, authorship, and completeness.
Procedural Experience
We evaluate your processes from the worker's perspective. Was the worker informed of the concerns before being called into a meeting? Were they given the opportunity to respond? Was a support person offered and their attendance recorded? Was the information the employer relied upon shared with the worker before the decision was made? If not, the process fails the procedural fairness test regardless of the employer's intent.
The Value
The cost of Threshold Dx 42 is a fraction of the cost of the problem it identifies.
Your evidence is strong enough to dispute liability from day one. No provisional payments. No excess. No claims experience impact. Threshold Dx 42 confirms your readiness.
Your evidence supports a determination within the statutory window. Interim entitlements are paid during the assessment but cease upon determination. No deemed acceptance. No ongoing liability. Threshold Dx 42 identifies the gaps that prevent you from reaching Tier 1.
Your evidence is too weak or too slow. Deemed acceptance. Employer excess of up to AU$5,210 per claim. Weekly benefits back-paid at 95% of PIAWE. Medical and treatment expenses. Legal costs. Premium impact compounding over multiple renewal cycles. Lifecycle cost per claim: AU$150,000 to AU$300,000 or more. Threshold Dx 42 tells you exactly where and why.
A single unnecessary factual investigation costs AU$5,000 to AU$15,000. If your documentation architecture can eliminate even one unnecessary investigation, the diagnostic has paid for itself.
A single deemed acceptance costs multiples of the diagnostic fee in direct excess, insured costs, and premium impact. If the diagnostic prevents one deemed acceptance, the return is measured in tens of thousands of dollars.
What You Receive
A written Threshold Dx 42 Diagnostic Report containing:
- Process timeline mapping benchmarked against the 42-day statutory window, with failure points and days lost identified
- Evidence architecture audit showing where your documentation meets or falls below the forensic standard
- Procedural fairness assessment from the worker's perspective across your grievance, investigation, and performance management processes
- Claims history analysis showing your exposure profile to conduct-based psychological injury claims
- Financial exposure statement showing the cost created by each identified failure point
- Identification of where factual investigations can be eliminated through stronger documentation
- An executive briefing to senior leadership presenting key findings (up to 60 minutes)
What You Do Not Receive
Threshold Dx 42 identifies where your system fails. It does not redesign the system. Implementation, process redesign, and remediation are separate engagements. This boundary is maintained to ensure the diagnostic remains independent and objective.
What You Provide
- All current policies and procedures related to complaints, grievances, workplace investigation, performance management, disciplinary action, and meeting protocols including support person provisions
- Any templates currently used for investigation reports, meeting records, and procedural documents
- One to two de-identified past case files as a reality check sample
- Three to five years of claims history with claim type identified, specifically flagging psychological injury and conduct-based claims
- Description of your current investigation procurement process, including engagement method (internal, external panel, or insurer-arranged) and typical timelines from decision to appoint through to final report delivery
- Description of internal decision-making timelines and approval pathways from complaint notification through to submission to the insurer, including escalation points
- Sample worker communications including notification of concerns, meeting invitations, responses provided, and outcome communications issued to the worker
- Description of roles and accountability across HR, WHS, management, and any external parties involved in complaint handling and decision-making
- Description of how information and documentation are prepared and submitted to the insurer, including timing, format, and completeness of submissions
Who This Is For
NSW employers with:
- Annual workers compensation premium exposure of AU$200,000 or above
- Workforce in sectors with elevated psychological injury exposure: healthcare, aged care, transport, logistics, education, corporate services, emergency services
- Internal HR and WHS processes in NSW that have not been stress-tested against the 42-day statutory timeline
- Current or recent psychological injury claims, workplace complaints, or investigation activity
Pricing
Pre-Commencement Rate
Before 1 July 2026
AU$4,500
+ GST
Standard Rate
From 1 July 2026
AU$12,500
+ GST
Fixed fee. No hourly rates. No scope variations. No ongoing commitment required. Completed within five business days from receipt of documentation. Executive briefing scheduled within ten business days of engagement commencement.
Why Now
The NSW reforms take effect from 1 July 2026. Employers with NSW operations who have not tested their internal system against the 42-day window before that date will discover their exposure through their first deemed acceptance, not through preparation.
A single deemed acceptance will cost your organisation multiples of this fee. Threshold Dx 42 is not an expense. It is the cheapest way to find out whether your NSW system will survive 1 July.