Disability insurance in a war zone

Posted by Gene Killian on May 21, 2012

The New Jersey Law Journal reports that defense contractors' employees who worked in Iraq and Afghanistan are suing Prudential Insurance, alleging that it sold policies without disclosing that war-zone deaths and injuries were not covered.

The policies, sold to civilians at U.S. military bases overseas, were worthless as a result, the plaintiffs charge in Menkes v. Prudential, No. 12-2880, filed in federal court in Newark last week.

Long-term disability, supplemental term life and supplemental accidental death and dismemberment policies excluded claims "due to war, declared or undeclared, or any act of war." The putative class action seeks compensation for workers for defense contractors in Iraq or Afghanistan from Feb. 10, 2006, to the present who bought the policies that contained the war-zone exclusion. It also seeks compensation for a subclass of workers whose claims were denied based on the exclusion.

The plaintiffs are represented by Michael Galpern, of the Locks Law Firm in Cherry Hill.

The case will be interesting to follow.  In my experience, New Jersey federal courts tend to be defense-oriented, but this matter has a large sympathy factor involved.

ERISA's "arbitrary and capricious" standard

Posted by Gene Killian on March 01, 2011

There's a disturbing article over at Bloomberg about the (pretty horrendous) games insurance companies play with respect to policies governed by ERISA.  The ironic thing is that the ERISA statute was designed to protect workers.  But the so-called "arbitrary and capricious" standard of review sets such a low bar that claims often get denied for reasons invented out of whole cloth.  (I've handled a few of those myself.) Shame on any claims person who does this.  Shame on any company spokesperson who defends the practice.  Shame on any judge who lets the carrier get away with it.  And let's all remember that when the government eventually steps in to regulate this area more strictly, the industry has only itself to blame.