denied group life insurance coverage

[aszafran]

I live in PA, and I recently applied for group life insurance through my husband's employer. I applied for spousal coverage for a flat $25000, the only option available. An important note is that I am in remission to Hodgkins Lymphoma (cancer), and have been for about 6 months. I was denied coverage, as they said that there is no open enrollment period and they were underwriting my application. I might be getting life insurance confused with medical coverage, but I thought they couldn't underwrite for group applications. Ironically, I used to work for this insurance company as a contract analyst. (Don't I wish I had paid more attention to the underwriting rules!) Any thoughts??

 

[ALawyer]

Originally, on TRUE group insurance every person employed on the original start date was covered, up to a set smount (or formula obtained limit), without individual underwriting.

Many plans also offered, as an option, spousal and family coverage. The real risk of "adverse selection" was deemed manageabale, and employees were given an option of adding the on that "start date".

BUT late entrants pose far more serious major risk of adverse selection. And thus employers and insurance companies can attempt to eliminate this MAJOR risk by doing underwriting on late entrants IF the policy so provides.