Company A buys out Company B. Everything changes effective March 1 INCLUDING insurance coverage. It's a different plan with a different carrier with different coverage. Totally!
A long-time employee of Company B has had medical problems for 3 years..cancer being the centerpiece of all of them. He is currently recovering from more cancer surgery after which he will get together with his oncologist to see in which direction they will go and what protocol will be used. EXCEPT THAT
The employee will no longer be covered by the plan he has so he has to find a new place, hospital, doctor WITHIN THE new plan or he will have to pay out a lot of money to stay outside it. Which he cannot afford. So the surgeons, doctors who have been with him since the beginning will have to be left behind and brand new everything and everyones will replace it. The current plan includes being a patient at the MAYO CLINIC in Phoenix. Top-rated place. The new plan that replaces it does not allow for treatment at the MAYO CLINIC. So he will have to move from the best place to something less than the best.
OK. I KNOW the new company has every right to do whatever the he** it wants to do to benefit itself. No question. However it would be nice if some accommodation could be reached for those who are in the midst of battling life-or-death situations. I don't know how it could be equitably managed. I don't know what it would cost the new company. But I think it would be a very excellent thing to honor what was available in such situations. The old plan provided $500/week disability benefit. The new plan provides $150/week disability benefit until the employee is released to go back to work. SIGH. Have any of you ever encountered anything like this? .
