Our welfare practice is comprehensive, encompassing group health, wellness, severance, disability and other welfare plans, and COBRA, HIPAA, FMLA, Mental Health Parity, GINA, Children's Health Insurance Program, Michelle’s Law, HEART, and CMS compliance. In those instances when HIPAA invokes broader federal and state privacy issues, we work with a multi-disciplinary legal team to address such issues. Our multidisciplinary Influenza and Pandemic Preparedness Team comprised of benefit, labor, privacy and environmental lawyers, works with employers to implement a preparedness program and to respond appropriately when an employee is, or appears to be, infected.
Representative examples of our experience in this area include:
- Filed a Request for Hearing with the CMS on behalf of a client that missed the retiree drug subsidy application deadline, an action that should yield approximately $6M in subsidy for the client.
- Drafted welfare benefit plan “wrap documents” to enhance cost efficiency by eliminating the need to maintain two separate sets of plan documents (i.e., summary plan description and plan documents).
- Provided guidance regarding the allocation and utilization of insurance reserves among multiple contributory and noncontributory welfare plans.
- Updated FMLA procedures and notices in light of new regulatory guidance.
- Advised a client how to cure federal and state privacy violations which occurred when COBRA notices regarding the ARRA subsidy were inadvertently sent to the wrong participants.
- Advised clients on successfully eliminating retiree medical arrangements.
- Successfully shifted COBRA obligations in connection with a labor dispute.