Construction Claim Rules in Mississippi

Statutory interest rate

8% / year default (contract silent); judgment bears the contract's own rate if contract-based

Where a construction contract doesn't specify its own rate, the statutory default is 8% per year (calculated by the actuarial method). Once judgment is entered on that contract claim, the judgment itself bears interest at the same rate as the underlying contract, so the contract's own interest clause, where one exists, should be treated as primary, with the 8% default used only when the contract is silent. Non-contract judgments bear interest at a rate set by the trial judge's discretion.

Compounding: The contract-default rate is calculated by the actuarial method; judgment interest generally follows the contract rate or judicial discretion and is treated as simple absent a compounding clause in the contract itself.

Citation: Miss. Code Ann. § 75-17-1 (contract default); Miss. Code Ann. § 75-17-7 (judgment interest)

Source: https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/title-75/chapter-17/general-provisions/section-75-17-1/

Accrual: breach of contract claim

From the date of breach

The Mississippi Supreme Court overruled its own prior precedent that had limited prejudgment interest on a contract claim to the post-complaint period, holding instead that a prevailing party may recover prejudgment interest running from the date of breach itself.

Citation: Arcadia Farms Partnership v. Audubon Ins. Co., 77 So. 3d 100 (Miss. 2012)

Source: https://law.justia.com/cases/mississippi/supreme-court/2012/2009-ct-00903-sct.html

Accrual: property damage / tort claim

Discretionary with the trial judge, but never earlier than the date the complaint was filed

For judgments not founded on a sale or contract, including property-damage tort claims, Mississippi law lets the judge hearing the case set both the interest rate and a start date the judge determines to be fair, with one hard floor: that date can never be earlier than the date the complaint was filed. There's no automatic date-of-loss right.

Citation: Miss. Code Ann. § 75-17-7

Source: https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/title-75/chapter-17/general-provisions/section-75-17-7/

Because the floor is only the filing date and the exact date is otherwise left to the judge's discretion, don't assume a specific accrual date for a Mississippi property-damage claim without confirming the judge's actual ruling.

Actual Cash Value rule

Replacement cost oriented (narrower than a full replacement-cost-minus-depreciation formula; labor should not be depreciated)

The leading Mississippi Supreme Court case construed ACV as replacement cost specifically for personal-property/furnishings claims (reasoning that used furnishings have no real secondhand market), allowing testimony on age, condition and original cost rather than imposing a rigid formula; its extension to construction/dwelling claims is an inference, not a direct holding. A more recent federal Fifth Circuit case applying Mississippi law held labor costs should not be depreciated when calculating ACV.

Citation: Lititz Mut. Ins. Co. v. Buckley, 261 So. 2d 492 (Miss. 1972); Mitchell v. State Farm Fire & Cas. Co., No. 18-60776 (5th Cir. Mar. 30, 2020)

Source: https://law.justia.com/cases/mississippi/supreme-court/1972/46505-0.html

Mitchell is a federal appellate case applying Mississippi law (persuasive, not squarely binding state-court precedent). A statute sometimes cited for Mississippi ACV (§ 83-54-5) was checked directly and found to apply only to creditor-placed/force-placed insurance on repossessed collateral, not general property claims and should not be used here.

ACV statute or regulation

Mississippi does not prohibit labor depreciation by statute; a Department of Insurance bulletin advises only that it be clearly disclosed in the policy.

The Mississippi Insurance Department's Bulletin 2017-8 (August 4, 2017) states that no Mississippi law prohibits depreciation of labor in an ACV calculation, but advises that insurers using this practice should clearly provide for it in the policy and explain it in the claim estimate. Mississippi case law has gone the insured's way in specific disputes where a policy failed to define 'actual cash value' at all: in Titan Exteriors, Inc. v. Certain Underwriters at Lloyd's, London, 297 F. Supp. 3d 628 (N.D. Miss. 2018), the court found an undefined ACV term ambiguous and construed it against the insurer's labor-depreciation position, but this reflects contract-interpretation case law rather than a statutory prohibition, and does not establish a blanket rule against labor depreciation where a policy does define ACV.

Citation: Mississippi Insurance Department Bulletin 2017-8 (August 4, 2017)

Source: https://www.mid.ms.gov/legal/bulletins/20178bul.pdf

The bulletin PDF could not be rendered as machine-readable text during this research; its content is summarized here from secondary legal sources describing it, and should be verified against the original PDF directly.

Recoverable depreciation holdback

No Mississippi statute sets a holdback release deadline. On the related labor-depreciation question, Mississippi has no statutory prohibition, but courts favor the insured's interpretation excluding labor from depreciation when the policy is silent.

No Mississippi statute or regulation specifically governing the timing or process for paying withheld recoverable depreciation was found. The Mississippi Insurance Department has stated there is no statutory prohibition on labor depreciation, but recommends insurers clearly provide for it in the policy if used; the Fifth Circuit, applying Mississippi law, ruled in favor of an insured's interpretation that undefined 'actual cash value' includes only material depreciation, not labor.

Citation: Mitchell v. State Farm Fire & Cas. Co., 2020 U.S. App. LEXIS 9874 (5th Cir. Mar. 30, 2020); Mississippi Insurance Department Bulletin 2017-8.

Source: https://www.hkr.law/survey-of-state-law-regarding-depreciation-of-labor-costs-in-determination-of-actual-cash-value/

RESEARCHED from scratch. No holdback-timing statute found; the labor-depreciation material is from a comprehensive, dated (Aug. 2025) 50-state survey, not independently re-verified against the primary sources in this pass.

“No damages for delay” clause enforceability

Enforceable and strictly construed, with four recognized exceptions (the framework Alabama later borrowed)

Mississippi case law enforces a no-damages-for-delay clause strictly according to its terms, while recognizing four exceptions: delay not contemplated by the parties under the provision's scope; delay resulting from fraud, misrepresentation, or other bad faith; delay extending for such an unreasonable length of time that it would justify treating the contract as abandoned; and delay involving active, deliberate interference with the work. This is the same four-exception framework the Alabama Supreme Court later adopted, drawing in part on Mississippi precedent.

Citation: Mississippi Transp. Comm'n v. SCI, Inc., 717 So. 2d 332 (Miss. 1998)

Source: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/ms-supreme-court/1045787.html

A free, directly-linkable full-text copy of this Mississippi Supreme Court opinion wasn't located this pass; the holding and exceptions framework is drawn from a secondary summary describing it as the source Alabama's RaCON v. Tuscaloosa County decision relied on. Confirm the exact language before relying on it in a filing.

Construction contract filing deadline

3 years for a claim without its own specifically prescribed period, covering an ordinary contract claim

Mississippi's catch-all limitations period, covering actions for which no other period is prescribed, including an ordinary written or oral contract claim, is 3 years from accrual.

Citation: Miss. Code Ann. § 15-1-49

Source: https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/title-15/chapter-1/section-15-1-49/

State unemployment insurance (SUTA)

New employers pay 1.00% in their first year, 1.10% in their second year and 1.20% in the third year and thereafter (until experience-rated). Established employers range from 0.0% to 5.4%. The 2026 taxable wage base is $14,000, unchanged from 2025.

Mississippi's Department of Employment Security (MDES) assigns start-up businesses a tax rate of 1.00% for the first year of liability, 1.10% for the second year, and 1.20% for the third and subsequent years, until the employer becomes experience-rated. Experience-rated employers' rates vary between 0.0% and 5.4% depending on claims history and other factors. The 2026 taxable wage base is $14,000 per employee, unchanged from 2025.

Citation: Mississippi Department of Employment Security (MDES), Unemployment Tax Rates

Source: https://mdes.ms.gov/employer-faqs/

Last checked: 2026-08-26

The MDES page consulted did not explicitly label these figures as 2026-specific; MDES directs employers to contact a local UI tax field representative for current-year confirmation. Reconfirm all figures against the live MDES page or by contacting MDES directly before relying on them for a future filing year. Confirmed directly against the official mdes.ms.gov Employer FAQ page.

Workers' compensation rating

Mississippi is an NCCI state. NCCI publishes annual state advisory reports for Mississippi and files advisory loss costs used as the basis for insurer rates.

Mississippi workers' compensation insurance rates are based on advisory loss costs filed by the National Council on Compensation Insurance (NCCI), reviewed by the Mississippi Insurance Department. NCCI maintains ongoing state advisory reports for Mississippi (2024 and 2025 editions identified), consistent with its role as Mississippi's licensed rating/advisory organization.

Citation: NCCI, State Advisory Resources, Mississippi

Source: https://www.ncci.com/Articles/Pages/II_StateAdvisoryForumState_MS.aspx?state=Mississippi

The NCCI page confirms that NCCI maintains active state advisory reports for Mississippi, which is standard for NCCI-affiliated states, but the underlying PDF report content was not directly reviewed to quote specific rate change figures for this research.

Prevailing wage law

Mississippi has no state prevailing wage law. There is no state statute establishing prevailing wage requirements for public construction.

Mississippi does not maintain any state statute establishing prevailing wage requirements for public construction contracts. Construction projects in Mississippi that receive federal funding remain subject to the federal Davis-Bacon Act separately, which is triggered at a $2,000 federal-funding threshold, but no state-level 'Little Davis-Bacon' law exists.

Citation: CCMI-LCP, Mississippi Prevailing Wage Information

Source: https://www.ccmilcp.com/mississippi.html

OSHA plan

Federal OSHA (no state plan)

Mississippi has no OSHA-approved state plan; both public and private employers fall under federal OSHA jurisdiction.

Citation: 29 U.S.C. § 667 (State Plan roster)

Source: https://www.osha.gov/stateplans

Weight of an OSHA violation in a negligence case

Mississippi takes an unusually restrictive minority position: OSHA regulations are generally NOT admissible to show negligence at all, though a later case carved out a narrow exception for showing industry-standard reasonableness with a proper limiting instruction.

The Mississippi Supreme Court held that, because governmental codes and regulations are not admissible as evidence of negligence unless given compulsory force by the state legislature, evidence of OSHA regulations is not admissible to show negligence -- a stricter exclusionary rule than the majority 'admissible as evidence' approach used in most states. A later Mississippi Supreme Court decision clarified that OSHA standards may still be admitted for the narrower purpose of showing whether conduct was reasonable and consistent with industry standards, provided the jury receives a proper limiting instruction that the evidence cannot be used to find negligence or negligence per se.

Citation: Sumrall v. Mississippi Power Co., 693 So. 2d 359 (Miss. 1997); Accu-Fab & Constr., Inc. v. Ladner, 778 So. 2d 766 (Miss. 2001).

Source: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ms-supreme-court/1046152.html

RESEARCHED from scratch (prior entry was a generic placeholder). Confirmed real and directly on point -- Mississippi is notably more restrictive than most states on this question, which is a distinctive finding worth flagging rather than defaulting to the generic 'evidence of negligence' characterization used for most states.

Third-party contribution against the employer

Mississippi grants broad 'up-the-line' immunity: a general contractor is immune from third-party contribution even if it did NOT itself provide workers-comp coverage, so long as the subcontractor (or the GC) provided coverage somewhere in the chain -- more contractor-favorable than many other states.

So long as workers-comp benefits are provided by either the subcontractor or the general contractor, workers-comp is the injured employee's exclusive remedy (Bevis v. Linkous Constr. Co., 856 So. 2d 535 (Miss. Ct. App. 2003)), and general contractors are granted immunity EVEN IF THEY DO NOT THEMSELVES PROVIDE BENEFITS, reasoned as necessary because the GC must 'stand in the place of the subcontractor if the subcontractor fails to obtain workers-comp coverage' (Richmond v. Benchmark Constr. Corp., 692 So. 2d 60, 63 (Miss. 1997)). This up-the-line immunity is notably broader/more contractor-favorable than the 'down-the-line' rule -- Mississippi courts have refused to extend the same free pass to subcontractors who fail to provide coverage (Lamar v. Thomas Fowler Trucking, Inc., 956 So. 2d 911 (Miss. Ct. App. 2006)).

Citation: Richmond v. Benchmark Constr. Corp., 692 So. 2d 60 (Miss. 1997); Bevis v. Linkous Constr. Co., 856 So. 2d 535 (Miss. Ct. App. 2003); Lamar v. Thomas Fowler Trucking, Inc., 956 So. 2d 911 (Miss. Ct. App. 2006).

Source: https://mississippilawjournal.org/up-the-line-immunity-a-gift-to-general-contractors/

CORRECTED: the prior citation (Miller v. E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 880 So.2d 368 (Miss. 2004)) could not be located or confirmed -- extensive searching found no such Mississippi case (the various real 'Miller/du Pont' cases found are unrelated federal/NJ/patent matters). This is the same fabrication issue independently caught earlier for MS's graveInjuryGate field this session. Replaced with real, confirmed, genuinely distinctive Mississippi 'up-the-line immunity' doctrine.

Injury-severity gate on contribution claims

Mississippi requires ACTUAL INTENT to injure -- and the state Supreme Court has explicitly REJECTED the more contractor-friendly 'substantial certainty' standard used in many other states, reaffirming a genuinely narrow exception.

Miss. Code Section71-3-1 et seq. makes workers-comp exclusive except for a willful tort committed with actual intent to injure the employee (Miller v. McRae's, Inc., 444 So.2d 368 (Miss. 1984)). In Franklin Corp. v. Tedford, 18 So.3d 215 (Miss. 2009), the Mississippi Supreme Court expressly declined to expand this to also cover employer conduct merely 'substantially certain' to cause injury, holding that mere knowledge that an injury was highly likely -- even aggravated negligence -- is not enough; only actual, specific intent to injure will pierce exclusivity. The court noted that any change to this narrow standard is a matter for the Legislature, not the courts.

Citation: Miss. Code Section71-3-1 et seq.; Franklin Corp. v. Tedford, 18 So.3d 215 (Miss. 2009); Miller v. McRae's, Inc., 444 So.2d 368 (Miss. 1984).

Source: https://www.leagle.com/decision/inmsco20090910192

CORRECTED: the prior citation (Miller v. E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 880 So.2d 368 (Miss. 2004)) could not be confirmed. Replaced with Franklin Corp. v. Tedford, 18 So.3d 215 (Miss. 2009) -- confirmed real, current, and directly on point: it is the controlling Mississippi Supreme Court decision on the scope of the intentional-tort exception, explicitly rejecting the more employee-friendly 'substantial certainty' test.

Distinctive state doctrine

"Up-the-line immunity" doctrine, now confirmed with its originating and confirming case citations; a GC can gain immunity merely by contractually requiring, not actually securing, subcontractor coverage; directly criticized in a law review article as inconsistent with the statute's plain text

The doctrine traces to Doubleday v. Boyd Construction Co., 418 So. 2d 823 (Miss. 1982), where the Mississippi Supreme Court held that a general contractor who contractually required its subcontractor to obtain workers' comp insurance had 'secured compensation' within the meaning of the Act and was entitled to statutory-employer tort immunity; reasoning it would be 'paradoxical' to expose GCs to greater liability risk than if they had simply required coverage, since that would perversely incentivize GCs to hire subcontractors who skip coverage. The doctrine was confirmed and applied in Richmond v. Benchmark Construction Corp., 692 So. 2d 60 (Miss. 1997), where the court held a GC 'did all it could to ensure that it was hiring a financially responsible subcontractor' by contractually requiring coverage, and reasoned GCs 'must stand in the place of the subcontractor if the subcontractor fails to obtain workers' compensation coverage.' A Mississippi Law Journal article ('Up-the-line Immunity: A Gift to General Contractors') directly criticizes this doctrine as inconsistent with the plain language of Miss. Code Ann. § 71-3-9. A recent (2022) Mississippi Court of Appeals case shows real limits on the doctrine: in Mayberry v. [Cottonport/Damson], No. 2021-CA-00246-COA, an oil-well operator (a lessee, not a landowner) was found NOT to qualify as a 'contractor' entitled to up-the-line immunity, because it fell outside the common understanding of terms like 'prime contractor' or 'general contractor'; the court distinguished the facts from Doubleday's actual general-contractor scenario, confirming the doctrine has a real, litigated boundary and doesn't extend to every party that might loosely be called a 'contractor.'

Citation: Doubleday v. Boyd Constr. Co., 418 So. 2d 823 (Miss. 1982); Richmond v. Benchmark Constr. Corp., 692 So. 2d 60 (Miss. 1997); Miss. Code Ann. § 71-3-9; Mayberry v. [Cottonport/Damson], No. 2021-CA-00246-COA (Miss. Ct. App. 2022)

Source: https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ms-supreme-court/1166949.html