If you are a C-Suite executive or a knowledge worker (systems engineer, computer coder), you got there by your hard work and knowing how to use your brain and your talent set to make money. You've probably had a coach or mentor along the way to guide you.
Now, something has happened to you that affects either your cognitive ability or your energy level. If you now find that you cannot do the job that requires you to be 100% on your game in order to compete, you are probably hearing this from the long-term disability insurance company:
- Your job is sedentary, you can sit for more than six hours a day, therefore you must be able to do your job.
- You worked for a long time with this condition, what's different now?
- You don't have any negative performance reviews.
- All of your cognitive complaints are self-reported.
- Fatigue? Everyone's a little tired, what's the big deal?
- Your doctors can't even agree on what your diagnosis is!
If you might need to file for long-term disability benefits and you are a typical C-Suite executive or knowledge worker, you probably started by trying to handle the claim yourself. After all, you thought, how hard could this be, my claim is obvious. You also may have thought there's no way I would trade my high salary for this much small disability payment, so surely they will accept what my doctors and I are saying.
Then the insurance adjuster started raising one or more of the points above. Your claim may even have already been denied. Maybe you came across our "Don't just say I APPEAL video."
You may even have started to look for a coach or mentor for this area of your life and came across my video where I rant against fake disability lawyers and tell you what to look for.
We just want you to know that you are in the right place. If you have doctor support for your claim, we can be your sherpa. If you don't yet have clear support we can discuss a strategy for clarifying and providing objective medical evidence for your claim.
Three Things A C-Suite Executive or Knowledge Worker Should Ask a Long-Term Disability Attorney Before Filing a Claim:
- How many long-term disability lawsuits have you ever filed for people like me? Yes, sure, most claims resolve without a lawsuit, but a lawyer who handles only one to five ERISA disability lawsuits a year is a low experience lawyer. You do not want a lawyer who dabbles in this highly niched, specialized area of the law. You didn't hire just any coach to get you where you are. Most of our clients tell us they did not want a lawyer who was not a successful, high performer like they are. You can go on Pacer to verify any lawyer's claim about federal litigation experience, but you have to do a Google search to figure out the high performance part.
- Can I have a one-on-one coaching session with you? If you haven't yet filed a claim, spending one hour with us will open your eyes to the issues. We promise this. When you find an experienced long-term disability attorney, pay for that expertise. You didn't get to where you are in life by going for the lowest cost alternative, did you?
- What does a pre-application coaching session include? (For most claims, you want the lawyer to review your policy and your recent medical records, and then strategize with you about the best path forward. You also want a lawyer who is going to go deep about you. Wait for them to ask this question: "if I were to follow you around for a day, before your medical issues slowed you down) what would I have seen?"
Three Things A C-Suite Executive or Knowledge Worker Should Ask a Disability Attorney AFTER you receive a claim denial:
- What Happened? (An experienced attorney’s office should be able to answer this for you in some detail based only on your denial letter. We have a ton of experience with all the major disability insura companies (and some you never heard of. We do that for free.)
- What’s Next? (You are always entitled to at least one appeal of your claim after a denial, but "appealing" won't get you anywhere unless there is a battle-tested plan in place.)
- Will You Handle My Case All the Way Through to a Lawsuit If Necessary? The only acceptable answer to this is Yes. Here’s why: the same insurance company that just incorrectly decided your claim may also incorrectly decide your appeal. You are an expensive proposition for them. You WILL be treated differently because of your income.
Why does all this matter? Because the law says that in general, no new information can be added to your claim if you have to file a lawsuit after your appeal is denied. If there is evidence you want the judge to consider, you must add it to your appeal. If there are things the insurance company missed in evaluating your claim, you have to present your evidence in the appeal. There’s no such thing as saving your best arguments for the judge in these cases. Your appeal is your one and only chance to add everything a judge might later need to decide your case. DON’T WASTE IT!
How The BenGlassLaw Long-Term Disability Team Will Help
- If you have a letter from an insurance company, we’ll review it for free and let you know what we think. There’s no obligation and we do it for free. If you decide that’s all you need, just let us know and we’ll be here if you need us again in the future.
- If you have a question or want to discuss your claim, we offer a flat-fee initial consultation (currently $600). At a minimum, we will need to review a copy of your disability policy before getting on a call or video chat to discuss your case. If appropriate, we will also review any recent medical records you send us. If you hire us at any point to do additional work on your claim, we will credit the appeal fee to the fee for future work. Often, this is all our clients need to resolve their case.
The Best $600 Ever Spent by a "Sedentary" Executive
Our best consultation outcome to date was for a C-Suite executive who was receiving benefits but had a routine question about his policy. When reviewing his folder of documents, we noticed he was not being paid under a policy provision we thought was designed for high earning executives in his situation. As part of his $600 consultation fee, we wrote a letter to the insurance company raising a question about it. A few weeks later, the insurance company agreed that he had been underpaid and sent him a check for nearly $500,000 for past due benefits. Best $600 he ever spent (and best “thank you” lunch our team was ever treated to…)!
