Unfortunately, those with disability claims often believe that the most qualified person to assist with a disability claim is a lawyer. From where I’m sitting, thinking a lawyer will get you over the hurdle of disability claims management, is a little like seeking out an academic PhD to fix the plumbing in your toilet.
Look, in the last 25 years, I’ve worked with lawyers, without them, and in spite of them. During my Unum whistleblowing days back in 2000, lawyers, for the most part weren’t kind to me. There were those who took advantage of me and then when they had all the information they needed to win multimillion dollar cases, dropped me like a hot potato. Am I biased against attorneys? Well, somewhat.
But, let’s keep the direction of this article restricted to what’s happening now and as objective as I can possibly be. From what I’m being told by insureds who contact me, attorneys are still asking for forward/back contingency fees, such as 30% of past recoverable benefits and as much as 45% of benefits moving forward to duration of claim. If you take pencil to paper, these fees often result in 6 figure attorney’s fees over the life of the claim.
I had to stop referring people to one of my favorite attorneys because he demanded $10,000 downpayment fees for ERISA appeals. I don’t know too many ERISA folks who can afford a $10,000 up front fee. But, what disturbs me the most is that attorneys are taking disability cases and they don’t know a damn thing about what they’re doing. Passing the bar does not qualify any attorney for the management of disability claims.
Insureds who are contacting me share all sorts of horror stories, from attorneys never contacting them, to attorneys not returning phone calls, to attorneys who tell them to do all the wrong things. Those attorneys who sit back and allow appeals to expire so they can go to court (where all their money is) is to me unethical, but I’ve known for many years they do that.
This is the reason I don’t accept cases where there is an attorney involved. It’s just too heartbreaking for me to sit on the side and watch an attorney bungle a claim. Please be careful out there of disability chasing attorneys looking for unreasonable fees for doing nothing.
