A jury has found Unum, the largest disability insurance company in the world, guity of fraud in forcing some claimants to apply for social security disability benefits.
The full story on Unum is here.
The lawsuit was filed under a federal whistle-blower statute that allows private citizens to sue on behalf of government programs if they believe they have evidence of fraud. The lawsuit is being tried in United States District Court in Boston.
Here is an interesting case where the court rejected as "proof" video surveillance of a guy at his son's Little League baseball game. This is a MetLife Disability Case.
Virginia Disability Attorney Ben Glass
Wright v. Raytheon. Huge some of money being paid by these insurance companies to so-called indepedent reviewers. Read this opinion if your disability case has been "reviewed" by Amy Hopkins or Michael Rosenberg (cardiologist). You will find it interesting. The case is here.
This is an interesting case in which the court exposes MetLife's connection to a major review service and walks you through a really bad analysis of a fibromyalgia disability case.
The United States Senate is finally looking into the practice of insurance companies forcing able-bodied people to apply for Social Security disability benefits, worsening a severe backlog in the government program while increasing their own profits. Most disability insurance plans provide for payments even if the claimant is not so disabled that they would qualify for social security disability. This, many claim, is costing the government a ton of money.
Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the senior Republican on the Finance Committee, has sent letters to nine insurers, including giants UNUM and Aetna, requesting more information about their handling of disability claims and their requirement that virtually everyone apply for social security disability payments.
(One of the deep dark secrets of why most employer sponsored plans are virtual shams is that if you get SSDI benefits it reduces what the disability company has to pay you.)
“The last thing those who rely on Social Security need is for insurance companies to be clogging up the system by forcing ineligible applicants to apply,” he said.
Mr. Grassley told the insurers to report on how many of their claimants they had compelled to apply for Social Security in the last five years; how many appeals they had required people to file; and what methods they had used to screen the people beforehand to make sure they truly had a chance of qualifying for the government benefits.
