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A perennial debate exists in the white-collar space: do the benefits of self-disclosure outweigh the risks associated with providing the government with a road map to the company’s purported violation? Consistently, the Department of Justice, among other government agencies, has answered that...
This month’s Friday Five explores decisions regarding the timeliness of appeals, the support necessary to sustain an LTD termination decision, a court’s discretion to credit and discredit expert opinions, the circumstances under which an insured may be required to prove they were prejudiced by the...
This month’s Friday Five addresses two cases involving disability claims that touch on Covid-19, a Circuit Court ruling for an insurer, a district court ruling that a 20-year-old regulatory settlement precluded an insurer from relying on the opinions of physicians it hired, and a claim for breach of...
On June 22, 2023, the Oregon legislature passed the Oregon Consumer Privacy Act (OCPA) SB 619 with a nearly unanimous vote in the senate. The bill was developed over the last four years by the Attorney General's Consumer Privacy Task Force, created to answer the call for comprehensive consumer...
This month’s Friday Five covers cases relating to what constitutes a fiduciary function, a finding of disability despite working full-time, an enforcement of suit limitation clause, the circumstances under which reinstatement is an appropriate remedy, and ERISA preemption. The Saul Ewing LLP...
This month’s Friday Five covers cases relating to a plaintiff’s attempts to seal a complaint seeking disability benefits, an administrator’s uncommunicated decision to discontinue its investigation into certain medical conditions, an administrator’s loss of the deferential standard of review for...
Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (“HHS”) Office for Civil Rights (“OCR”) announced two (2) different settlements, one with a HIPAA business associate for $350,000 and one with a HIPAA-covered entity pursuant to the OCR Right of Access Initiative for $15,000...
On May 11, 2023, Tennessee became the eighth state to join the most recent trend in state legislation when Governor Lee signed the Tennessee Information Protection Act (TIPA) into law. Tennessee follows other states that have recently enacted comprehensive privacy legislation, starting with...
This month’s Friday Five explores two recent decisions that discuss limitations on benefits when both physical disability and disability arising from mental illness are alleged, whether remand of a claim by the court constitutes a new appeal or a continuation of the previous appeal, whether an order...
This month’s Friday Five explores recent decisions that reflect the precise nature of rules and definitions in the context of ERISA claims. For example, effective dates of CFR code provisions and contractually defined limitation periods can draw specific points on the timeline of a case. Similarly...
On Wednesday, March 15, Iowa’s House Legislature unanimously voted to approve Senate File 262 (SF 262), a comprehensive data privacy bill that unanimously passed the Senate on March 6. The bill will now move to the Governor’s desk to be signed into law (if the Governor does not sign or veto the bill...
This month's Friday Five covers cases relating to issue preclusion, coverage where the policy terms are inconsistent with the parties’ behavior, application of the abuse of discretion standard of review, applicability of a waiver of premium provision and compliance with a mandatory appeals process...
The 2021 calendar year reports from HHS OCR describe OCR’s efforts that calendar year and are instructive tools for all parties who need to comply with HIPAA to understand macro-level trends. What You Need to Know: OCR continues to receive tens of thousands HIPAA complaints each year. “Large”...
This month’s Friday Five covers cases relating to potential impacts of COVID-19, full and fair review of the claim file, an attempt to use an insurer’s internal policy against itself, and a “second bite at the apple” by amending a complaint for denial of benefits to include a claim for breach of...