Three former Sprint Communications employees asked a Kansas federal court to approve its multimillion-dollar proposed class action against Sprint, which the parties reached through mediation. According to the former employees, the settlement will permit them to end their suit without testing their novel legal theory while still increasing their pension benefits for life and the benefits for their Read More

Federal appellate courts issued various decisions involving the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) in the latter half of 2023. Here are five important ERISA decisions that benefits attorneys should know. Cunningham et al. v. Cornell University et al., case number 21-88, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit issued an opinion affirming the Read More

The New York City Law Firm Fairmark Partners is investigating filing a class action lawsuit against aerospace company Lockheed Martin regarding its handling of employee healthcare premium contributions. As a result, the law firm is soliciting feedback from current and former Lockheed Martin employees on the TopClassActions website. Fairmark cites dramatically increasing healthcare costs as the impetus for its Read More

The Senate Finance Committee unanimously voted to advance the Better Mental Health Care, Lower-Cost Drugs and Extenders Act, a comprehensive bill seeking increased transparency and comprehensive PBM reform. The bill also would create a list of discounted drugs with high rebates available in Medicare Part D and address various other healthcare issues. Among the provisions in the bill are the following: The Read More

A panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit recently heard oral arguments in the appeal of an unlawful discrimination case involving a county health plan’s exclusion of coverage of gender transition surgery. The case is Anna Lange v. Houston County, Georgia, et al., case number 22-13626, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Houston County, Georgia, and its Sheriff, Cullen Talton, appealed Read More

An oboist who performed as an extra musician for the New York Metropolitan Opera for more than 30 years filed suit against the company, alleging that it allegedly restricted access to its retirement plan for extra musicians in violation of ERISA. The case is Sharon Meekins v. The Metropolitan Opera Association Retirement Plan et al., case number 1:23-cv-09990, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New Read More

A former employee of Advance Publications, Inc., the holding company for Conde Nast, voluntarily dismissed his proposed class action ERISA 401(k) suit over poorly performing BlackRock funds. Ex-worker Jermaine Anderson had the opportunity to raise ERISA claims in a second amended complaint following the dismissal of his amended complaint but instead chose to dismiss the lawsuit. The dismissal comes as similar Read More

Jane Doe, a transgender woman with gender dysphoria, sued Independence Blue Cross (IBX) after it denied coverage for facial feminization surgeries (FFS) as cosmetic and not medically necessary. Doe filed sex and disability discrimination claims under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (Section 504), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), as well as claims under the Employee Read More

Although the Internal Revenue Code does not allow employers to exclude part-time employees, it has allowed them to exclude employees from their 401(k) plans until they have worked at least 1,000 hours in a year. As a result, employers historically used this rule to exclude part-time employees from plan participation, including the right to make elective salary deferral contributions to a plan. However, the Setting Read More

As the healthcare industry has begun to use artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms in its claims determination process, litigation has ensued. In a recent class action lawsuit, plaintiffs claim that UnitedHealthcare used its “nH Predict” AI algorithm to wrongfully deny elderly patients’ claims for post-acute care, including stays in skilled nursing-care facilities and in-home care. When patients appeal the denials Read More