In Missouri and throughout the county ERISA Liens are becoming more complicated and more common in car accident and other personal injury settlements. Essentially, if you are injured in a car accident or have an other actionable personal injury claim, and your health plan is an employer funded health plan and qualified under ERISA, the plan can sometimes circumvent State anti-subrogation laws. For more on health insurer subrogation, see: Personal Injury Settlement in Missouri: Can Your Health Insurer Demand Payback for Medical Expenses?
What does this mean to a personal injury victim in Missouri? When your auto accident or other injury claim settles your injury lawyer needs to make sure: (1) if any qualified ERISA plan has a valid lien, and if so, (2) to minimize that lien to maximize your recovery.
Important issues an injury attorney must investigate before resolving a claimed ERISA Lien include making sure the ERISA Plan's contractual language actually even create a lien against the personal injury settlement; the current state of law regarding ERISA Plans and what it is in your jurisdiction; equitable defenses, including the make whole doctrine and the pro rate sharing of losses. For a detailed analysis of the effect ERISA plans have on personal injury cases and eight ways to deal with them see Eight Ways to Defeat or Minimize ERISA Claims, by Roger Barron. Eight-Ways-Article - ERISA PLANS.pdf
See: Dont Lien On Me.pdf - For detailed information on liens and personal injury settlements and judgments.
Missouri injury attorney Ben Sansone has settled hundreds of cases from small car accident cases to large brain injury cases and wrongful death claims. Lien resolution and aggressive bill collectors is a reality when settling many cases today and these issues need to be addressed immediately, because if left to linger they can become huge problems in the future and can hold up injury settlements.
