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Wondering if legal action is an option after getting screwed by my previous employer.
JimJimBinks
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I got laid off on December 18th of 09. It was the day before I was leaving on a 10 day vacation with my wife to visit my family out of state. It had nothing to do with performance. In fact, I was told that if a position opened up I would be first on the list to be re-hired. At the same time, I was told that my health insurance was cut off as of that day. More than the layoff, the lack of health insurance caused a lot of stress, especially having it pulled out from under us like that. Especially since we were going out of town the next day. January and February were horribly stressful mainly because of the lack of insurance and being unable to go to the doctor for any problems we were having because we couldn't afford it. We both ended up getting sick.
A week ago we finally got health insurance through my wife's job. I'm finally able to go to the doctor for the problems I've been having that started in January.
When confirming my new insurance information through the insurance company, I found out that we were both actually covered on my insurance through the end of January even though I was told by my company that it was cut off that day in mid-December.
I wasn't the only person who was told this. Four of us were laid off within a couple of weeks of each other. All of us were told our coverage stopped that day.
Is this grounds for a lawsuit? We were lied to by the company and I missed out on a month of being able to go to a doctor (When going would've really helped me) while my wife and I were overly stressed about not having any coverage at all.
A week ago we finally got health insurance through my wife's job. I'm finally able to go to the doctor for the problems I've been having that started in January.
When confirming my new insurance information through the insurance company, I found out that we were both actually covered on my insurance through the end of January even though I was told by my company that it was cut off that day in mid-December.
I wasn't the only person who was told this. Four of us were laid off within a couple of weeks of each other. All of us were told our coverage stopped that day.
Is this grounds for a lawsuit? We were lied to by the company and I missed out on a month of being able to go to a doctor (When going would've really helped me) while my wife and I were overly stressed about not having any coverage at all.
JimJimBinks on
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This is probably something best asked of a lawyer. Most of them will give you a free initial consult.
What really sucks is that ONLY the employer can tell you when your insurance will end. I work for an insurance company and we have no idea what the last day of coverage is going to be unless they are on a federal COBRA continuation. The employer can cancel the policy at any time, and even backdate the cancellation......(I have had many an angry call about this)
Your biggest problem is going to be that you were told verbally, and you really have no "proof". Sure, you have other people who were told the same thing, but ultimately it's your word vs the company. My advice for anyone else - or for you in the future if this ever happened again, is ask for everything in writing. If they are going to cancel your insurance today, I would let them know that you are going to need that cancellation in writing. Chances are that it's illegal in your state to drop coverage on your term date, but it's not illegal to trick you into not using it. A lot of people will wring every dime from insurance once they are fired - so I am sure this was just to keep as many of you from doing that as possible.