There is a bill called the Employee and Retiree Access to Justice Act pending in both the House of Representatives and the Senate which could make ERISA much fairer. If you have a long-term disability benefit or disability policy, pension, retirement benefit, health insurance, or life insurance connected through the workplace, most often it is governed by a law called ERISA. Most of our clients have either been treated unfairly by an insurance company or companies using that law. Other clients have children, loved ones, or friends who have benefits governed by ERISA.

One bill is pending in the House of Representatives and is called the “Employee and Retiree Access to Justice Act,” H.R. 7740. A companion bill, S. 4219, is in the Senate.
This bill, if made law, would ban arbitration and discretionary clauses in employer-sponsored benefit plans governed by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA). Again, this is not a political issue but a fairness issue so that insurance companies do not continue with unfair advantage regarding their decisions.

Right now, an insurance company or plan administrator can make an incorrect decision, but if it has some reasonable basis for the decision, it still wins. Most of our clients are very aware of this because they have been on the receiving end of that unfairness. Friends and others you know are impacted by this every day. Insurance companies and other companies have profited considerably due to the unfairness of ERISA. This is a chance to stop it.

Contact Your Senator & Representative Now

You can send a letter, or you can call. In some instances, you may be able to leave a message on a website. Time is short because the House of Representatives goes into a summer recess at the end of July and the Senate goes into recess on August 8 of this year.