Today’s blog post at the long-tenured Delaware employment law firm of Martin D. Haverly targets a relatively narrow and specific audience.
Namely, that is the workplace demographic of higher-tier (read executive) employees. That worker realm is notably confined when contrasted to a company’s population of rank-and-file workers, of course, yet it is also similar in many ways.
The Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) sets minimum requirements for benefit plan eligibility and protects any assets placed in those plans. After a certain amount of time working for your Delaware employer, you may find yourself needing to file a claim to receive benefits.
Here are just three types of benefits that fall under ERISA protection.
If it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.
We would ask Delaware readers of our Wilmington employment law blog at Martin D. Haverly to please excuse our reference to a most time-worn and arguably overused maxim. The duck analogy, though, does seem to tightly apply as a standard relevant to today’s above-posed entry headline, so we avail ourselves of it.
Can you imagine a company in Delaware or anywhere else that seeks to operate successfully without a written go-to source of materials that set expectations and detail policy specifics concerning key work-related matters?
We didn’t think so.
We note on our website at the established Delaware employment law firm of Martin D. Haverly in Wilmington that most benefit plans administered through private employers are governed by a comprehensive set of federal laws and regulations.
Those relevant rules and policies are detailed in a statute termed the Employer Retirement Income Security Act. Although many Americans are likely not familiar with that formal designation, they perhaps have some knowledge of the law through reference to its oft-used acronym.
“We wanted to send a message,” a jury foreman told reporters in the wake of a recently rendered verdict in an employment-linked matter.
Message received.
More than seven a day on average, every day of the year.
That number refers to pregnancy discrimination complaints fielded by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission during 2018. To be precise, the EEOC was asked to intervene in such matters 2,790 times.
Short answer to the above-posed headline query leading off today’s blog post: You might have.
A recurrent scenario plays out daily in Delaware workplaces and other employment locales spanning the country. Word ripples across a company that a top-tier employee has lost his or her job.
Dealing with long-term disability insurance is rarely simple. This is especially true when it comes to filing an appeal – a process that can feel like endless paperwork entangled in many hard-to-remember rules.
However, there is one important element that anyone appealing a long-term disability decision should be sure to do. If done right, it can set them up to have the best chance at success not just immediately, but down the line.
The above-posed headline query in today’s blog post is certainly not intended as a trick question. Readers of our long-tenured multi-practice Delaware law firm might reasonably intuit that there is no simple and definitive answer to the question, though.
In short, the employment agreements executed between management and workers in Delaware companies and nationally are variable and notably differentiated. Some contracts are flatly concise instruments that set forth wage and benefit matters and little else. Conversely, others – especially agreements signed by high-level employees – often run to many pages and encompass subject matter that is widely varied.
Bold labels are required.
Martin D. Haverly, Attorney at Law
Brandywood Plaza, 2500 Grubb Road
Suite 240-B
Wilmington,
DE
19810
Phone:
302-529-0121
Fax:
302-529-1123
Map & Directions
