Ohio National Disability Lawyer Representation for Your LTD Insurance Claim
Ohio National Life Insurance Company can be a very difficult company to deal with if you are trying to get paid disability insurance benefits.
Our law firm has represented and currently represents numerous doctors and business professionals throughout the country with their Ohio National Disability claim. Our disability attorneys can help you any stage of your disability claim.
Most Ohio National disability policies are not governed by ERISA and the monthly benefit amounts are usually in excess of $7,500. The definitions of total disability and residual disability are usually favorable in an Ohio National Life policy, which is an advantage for a claimant. Some of the policies also pay lifetime benefits, which is rare in today’s market. Ohio National is a mid size insurance company, but the sale of disability insurance is not a large part of their revenues.
The Disability Claim Department At Ohio National Is Not Cooperative
From our experience it seems that the disability claims handling department at Ohio National contains a few employees and in recent years has experienced a fair amount of employee turnover.
Our lawyers have seen a pattern in which Ohio National will routinely hire the same doctor to review their disability claims. For example, in several of our cases, Ohio has hired Dr. James R. Hawkins, M.D., board certified in psychiatry and neurology to review the medical records of our clients. We have never seen a report generated by Dr. Hawkins in which he determined that our client was disabled. Dr. Hawkins also happens to be conveniently located in the same city as Ohio National’s headquarters.
Nine Examples of Ohio National’s Unreasonable Disability Claim Handling Tactics
Let’s take a look at the manner in which Ohio National conducted itself during the pendency of a claim in which we represented a family medicine doctor that was being paid total disability benefits for five years.
During Ohio’s attempts to deny benefits to our client, we made the following request to Ohio National and they were all denied:
- Refused to provides a copy of any field interview reports or recorded statements that were provided to Ohio National by our client;
- Refused to allow the disability claimant to videotape any of the four Compulsory Medical Exams (CME) requested by Ohio National;
- Refused to allow the Compulsory Medical Exam to be videotaped;
- Refused to allow the claimant to have an independent witness present at the CME EXAM with four different doctors the claimant had never met before;
- Refused to provide either the disability claimant or his treating physician’s with the Raw Data from the neuropsychological IME exam that Ohio required the claimant to attend;
- Refused to release copies of the CME exam reports to the disability claimant;
- Refused to provide proof of the malpractice liability insurance for the CME doctors that had been hired by Ohio National to exam the claimant. Ohio is obviously unaware of the extensive case law that states a CME doctor may have a duty to the disability claimant even in the absence of a formal relationship. There have been numerous lawsuits against CME doctors for injury caused to a claimant and failure to diagnosis;
- Refused to provide the claimant with copies of any documentation that the claimant had submitted to Ohio National over the past 5 years;
- Denied knowledge of a disabling medical condition which was submitted in multiple medical records to Ohio National more than 5 years ago.
Ohio National’s conduct speaks for itself. In the case discussed above, Ohio expects the claimant to give them everything they ask for, but they don’t have to share anything with the policyholder. Thankfully our client continues to be paid; however Ohio National clearly understands that should they deny disability benefits our disability lawyers will immediately sue to recover benefits, attorney fees, costs, and any potential bad faith damages.
Contact us for a free phone consultation if you would like assistance with your claim.
