Talk:ERISA reimbursement

The content of this article has been derived in whole or part from http://www.plaintiffsolutionscenter.com/transperancyerisa.pdf. Permission has been received from the copyright holder to release this material under both the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported license and the GNU Free Documentation License. You may use either or both licenses. Evidence of this has been confirmed and stored by VRT volunteers, under ticket number 2011040410024181.
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Copyright[edit]

I have been in contact with the author that is in conflict and there is no copyright violation. The author Roger Baron freely gives license to use his article and reference to it.

Where can we verify that he has donated the work? —C.Fred (talk) 21:30, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

His email address is [redacted], I just communicated with him and he has given his permission freely. Christopherhamze (talk) 21:36, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Has he emailed OTRS, though? —C.Fred (talk) 21:38, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No, I am new to Wikipedia and unsure what is required. Can you help me through the process? Christopherhamze (talk) 21:41, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Ensure that Roger Baron is aware of what it means to donate material to Wikipedia, then have him follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Donating copyrighted materials#Granting us permission to copy material already online (starting at "For text"). Dabomb87 (talk) 21:58, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have emailed the author direction on how to grant wikipedia permission to copy materials already online and {{OTRS pending}} Christopherhamze (talk) 22:06, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How do I know when OTRS has received the correspondence from the author? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Christopherhamze (talk • contribs) 22:43, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

An OTRS volunteer has already received and confirmed the permission. That issue has been resolved; thanks for your patience. Dabomb87 (talk) 04:27, 5 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

NPOV issue[edit]

This article is obviously biased and appears to be written from the interested point of view of a tort lawyer. The article lacks any mention of the positive aspects of ERISA reimbursement. Birdinpine (talk) 00:30, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Word. I was about to check on this. It's an advertisement for Roger Baron! --Thusblogsanderson (talk) 13:27, 5 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As someone you has actually read the footnotes and is closely approaching graduation from law school, this article is very factually accurate. If Birdinpine has reliable, published, and verified information about the positive aspects of ERISA reimbursement, then you should add it to the page. Just saying lacks natural point of view is not helpful. Thusblogsanderson we should really keep these comments to constructive criticism that make this page better. Even though there are a of references to Professor Baron, it because he is one of the premiere legal scholars in this area of the law. I am removing the "lacks neutrality" until anyone can show actual evidence of the lack of neutrality.--Chrishamze (talk) 03:38, 8 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Chrishamze, are you an attorney? The article is written entirely from the ERISA beneficiary's POV. Let's walk through some quotes:

"The plans aggressively pursue reimbursement on a 'first dollar priority' basis with no consideration of the impact reimbursement leaves upon the insured."

Here's what's going on: an ERISA plan pays a beneficiary's medical costs. Then, when the beneficiary recovers in a tort suit against whoever injured him or her - a recovery that is based at least in part on paying actual damages for the injury's costs - the plan will seek subrogation or reimbursement against the beneficiary for the money it paid for those costs. Tort defendants aren't allowed to plead "hey, but you had insurance for that!" to get out of paying tort damages, so if the beneficiary collects from the tortfeasor AND from the plan for the same expenses, that's a double recovery.

You may say that my account is biased towards the plan's POV, but no less so than the article is towards the beneficiary's POV. If the plan is paying benefits on the condition of being allowed to subrogate, how is that unjust? More to the point: is the debate about WHETHER it's unjust something that an encyclopedia article should conceal in favor of one side's POV?

"Although proponents of ERISA Reimbursement argue that these recoveries flow to the benefit of other insureds, such has never been established.[7] In reality, these recoveries are treated as sources of profit for the insurers and those engaged in the collection business itself."

Did you catch that? First, a citation for "this has never been established" (citing Baron himself), and then an assertion that "in reality" the recoveries are "sources of profit for the insurers" - but where is the citation for that? "This has never been established" to Roger Baron's satisfaction, is the more accurate statement.

"These insurers furtively mold their coverages and policy provisions to fall under federal preemption and then mandate 'first dollar priority' on their self-granted reimbursement claims."

"Furtively"? And you're really questioning the POV issue?

This article is not neutral. It's written purely from the perspective of a law professor who advocates on behalf of ERISA beneficiaries. It's an embarrassment to Wikipedia. ... Which is why I will draft a new section for the article, based on more neutral sources like Supreme Court decisions, not a website offering "Plaintiff Solutions." --Thusblogsanderson (talk) 17:36, 26 April 2012 (UTC)[reply]