Reliance Standard’s Disability Denial Undone by Split 11th Cir.

Reliance Standard Life Insurance Co. wrongly denied disability benefits to a woman with an autoimmune disease based on medical care she received before her ultimate diagnosis, the Eleventh Circuit held.

It was unreasonable for Reliance to treat the woman’s scleroderma as a preexisting condition that defeated her eligibility for benefits based on doctor’s appointments and symptoms she had in the months before her policy became effective, the US Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit said Nov. 21 in a 2-1 split opinion. The insurer’s position “completely elides the distinction between receiving medical care for symptoms not inconsistent with ...