Life Benefits
Life Benefits
Wrongful denial of benefits claims cover a broad range of problems ranging from clerical errors to misreading of plan documents to outright refusal to pay a benefit you know is due. We file both administrative claims and lawsuits against insurance companies that fail to pay life insurance benefits to beneficiaries. Administrative claims, however, are not public information and we cannot disclose them here. Therefore the following is an example from a recent administrative claim:
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Your spouse's employer offers its employees various benefits -
including life insurance. The Company decides to cut the amount of
coverage in half (from $100,000 per employee to $50,000). However, the
Company never tells you or your spouse about this. Your spouse continues
to participate in the life insurance program, not knowing the coverage
is substantially less than you and your spouse thought was needed to
support your family if your spouse passed away. Unfortunately, your
spouse passes away without learning that the benefits were cut or after
learning of it only when it was too late to get replacement coverage.
Your family seeks to collect the life insurance from the company, but
the company, citing the reduction in coverage, refuses to pay the full
amount. Under federal law your employer has a duty to promptly and
directly inform your spouse that his benefits were cut.
Under most circumstances, your employer or its designee can be held liable for the money you should have received plus your attorney's fees, interest, and costs.
Representative Cases
The following is a list of lawsuits handled by our firm against life insurance companies for failure to pay benefits:
· Barletto v. UTC, plaintiff
a beneficiary of her son’s life insurance benefits sued United
Technologies for wrongfully denying payment claiming decedent’s death
was not an accident.
· Reynolds v. MetLife, plaintiff
a beneficiary of her husband’s life insurance benefits sued her
employer Xerox Corporation, the Xerox Corporation Plan, the claims
administrator Metropolitan Life Insurance Company and third party agent
Hewitt Associates for wrongfully denying payment, multiple breaches of
fiduciary duty and promissory estoppel for representing that the
decedent was covered by the plan and only notifying the plaintiff after
his death that he was not covered.
· Leyda v. AlliedSignal,
plaintiff claimed life insurance benefits on her husband’s life based
upon breach of ERISA summary plan description rule. Courtside trial.
Judgment for plaintiff. The decision was affirmed by the court of
appeals.
Generally,
lawsuits take from two to five years to complete. While usually a settlement
can be reached, sometimes trials are required. While we cannot assure
positive results, we have a proven track record of success. Further, our
lawyers and staff will be with you at every step to help you through
the process, answer questions and address concerns.
