The U.S. District of Minnesota has ruled in Peterson v. Unitedhealth Grp. Inc., No. 14-CV-2101 (PJS/BRT), 2017 WL 991043 (D. Minn. Mar. 14, 2017) that ERISA does not permit United Healthcare (“United”) to claw back alleged overpayments related to patients from one plan by reducing or eliminating payments related to patients from different self-insured plans, dealing a potential blow to the use of an effective tool that health insurers have used to recoup alleged overpayments from providers.

In Peterson, the Plaintiffs were healthcare providers who brought suit against United as assignees of patients who were enrolled in United-administered plans. United had allegedly overpaid Plaintiffs for services provided to certain patients, and offset these alleged overpayments by reducing or eliminating payments for services that Plaintiffs provided to other patients, who were members of different United-administered self-insured ERISA plans. This practice is known as cross-plan offsetting. Continue reading…

Justice Clarence Thomas and a unanimous US Supreme Court decided to vacate a Sixth Circuit decision and hold that the federal courts cannot assume from silence in a union’s collective bargain agreement that retiree group health insurance benefits continue indefinitely.  The Supreme Court found that collective bargain agreements should be treated the same as other contracts when the principles are consistent with federal labor policy.

The Court rejected the UAW-Yard Man decision and accompanying long standing principle called the Yard-Man Rule which provided that in the absence of clear contractual language a collective bargain agreement vested retirees with lifetime benefits. The Supreme Court’s M&G Polymers v. Tackett USA decision is attached here.

Check back for more in-depth analysis and coverage on this decision and its impact on employee benefits litigation or feel free to contact Cozen O’Connor’s Health Law and Employee Benefits Teams.