Short Term Disability and the Coronavirus
Worried about getting the coronavirus and losing time from work? Hoping your short term or long term disability policy will pay for your time off if you get sick? We will explore how some disability companies are handling disability claims resulting from COVID-19.
If your employer provides a short term disability policy, you may be hoping to use coverage from that plan in case you contract the coronavirus. Short term disability usually covers people who can’t work for brief periods of time. Although some short term policies can last for up to two years, the typical policy lasts between three and six months.
Will short term disability cover a coronavirus diagnosis?
Some short term disability companies have policy options for employees that might be quarantined due to COVID-19. If your short term disability policy includes a “quarantine rider” and you are quarantined due to the coronavirus, you may be eligible for benefits under the rider. In such cases, after the quarantine period, if the employee is determined to be disabled due to COVID-19, benefits could be paid for the disability until the maximum period under the plan (excluding any weeks paid for the quarantine period).
Quarantine Riders
A short term disability policy’s quarantine rider frequently covers employees if they are placed under a doctor ordered quarantine and are unable to perform the major duties of their job. Generally, the employee must be suspected of carrying or having been exposed to an infectious and contagious disease as determined by the doctor who would then order the quarantine. The nature of quarantine and the definition to support it is determined by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) or the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services.
What about Aflac or other accident policies? Will they cover COVID-19?
In many cases, an accident policy does not provide benefits for a sickness like COVID-19. However, benefits may be payable if the plan includes a hospital confinement sickness rider or a short-term disability rider that covers injuries and sickness benefits. Usually, the disability rider will not cover quarantine situations. It is important to read the details of your policy or contract to determine if such a benefit rider is included.
It is important to remember that under most short term disability policies, a covered individual must be unable to work, either at their place of employment or from home, and must experience a loss of income to be eligible for short term disability benefits.
Free Disability Policy Review
During this challenging time, the Ritchie Law Firm is offering a free review of your disability policies to determine if you might be eligible for short term disability benefits or quarantine benefits related to COVID-19. Call us today for your free review!
What Makes Ritchie Law Firm Different?
Many Virginia lawyers say they practice Social Security Disability law. But, most of those lawyers don’t work with long-term disability or short-term disability insurance claims. Before you hire any lawyer to handle your long-term or short-term disability claim, you should ask if he or she has been trained in handling or has handled ERISA claims before. If that attorney can’t answer yes, he or she is probably not the right lawyer for you.
That’s what makes us different. At the Ritchie Law Firm, we have a team of lawyers who have been trained to handle the complexities of long-term and short-term disability cases. Sure, we also handle Social Security Disability cases. But, ERISA long-term and short-term disability cases are a different beast. And, we know how to handle them.
If you have been denied long-term disability benefits, our disability team will review your denial letter for FREE. Then, with no obligation and NO STRINGS ATTACHED, we’ll tell you our game plan for winning your case.
If you want your long-term or short-term disability case handled by a team of lawyers trained to handle this difficult area of the law that few lawyers know the first thing about, your search is over. Whatever stage of applying for benefits you are in, whether you haven’t yet applied or you’ve been denied, we are happy to help. We can even help if you live in states other than Virginia or West Virginia by associating with counsel local to the jurisdiction where you live.
We can help with denials from both ERISA and non-ERISA (private) disability plans. Click here to give us some details about your case.