National Organization of Injured Workers

Injured On The Job To Screen Bad Faith, the Documentary!

After taking a well deserved year off to re-group and form the new National Organization of Injured Workers, producer Sam Gold and Injured On The Job, the only regularly scheduled television program to expose the fraud and corruption in Workers Compensation system are pleased to announce that with the resumption of the televison program in November, they will be screening acclaimed Emmy award winning director Barbara Donahue's "Bad Faith - The Documentary"!

Bad Faith deals with the fraud and corruption perpetrated by the disability insurance industry against those who purchased their policies and thought they would be covered in case of a long term disability. These same illegal tactics are used against injured workers in the Workers' Compensation industry as well, hence the reason for the screening as there are so many close parallels that affect us all!

Over 51.2 million people, nearly 1 out of 5 U.S. residents has some level of disability. Over half of our work force, 56% of the population, ages 21 to 64, has some type of disability.

The insurance industry, and specifically the disability insurance industry, is an industry rife with unlawful and unethical practices. The crisis is rooted in the industry's gross overselling of disability policies to younger professionals in the 1970's and 80's. As that population aged and its claims increased dramatically, the insurance companies began casting about for ways-not always legitimate-to cut their losses.

This is not about arguing with an insurance company over your standard coverage or their prompting you as the insured to seek mediocre care, this documentary is about insurance companies' deliberate "policy" of wrongfully black-balling policyholders, and using hardball tactics calculated to cheat them out of their rightful benefits.

Character Assassination (n.): an attack
intended to ruin someone's reputation.

Tactics such as, the threat of criminal charges, paying other individuals to make disparaging remarks about the insured, pressuring doctors to renege on their diagnosis, malice, fraud, oppression, involving the Social Security Administration, the IRS and even the United States Postal Service, deposing the insured's ex-spouse, counter-suing, stealing property and files, and finally, speaking to sources without permission and refusing to identify those sources, even in a court of law.

Commonplace in the disability insurance industry, all of these actions are intended to ruin the insured's reputation and cast doubt on their character.

Terms used by insurance companies are nebulous at best, and purposely vague. The actual insurance policies themselves are thick, contain small type and are virtually unintelligible. Their language and these clauses are purposefully impossible to understand and are designed to allow the insurance companies numerous ways to avoid paying their policyholders' claims.

Rea.son.a.ble (adj.): being within the bounds
of common sense.

and

Cus.tom.ar.y (adj.): based on custom and tradition
rather than written law or contract.

Human beings, like snowflakes, are unique and original. There are simply no two alike and no two treatments that work equally on each individual. The insurance company's terms show them to be uninformed and under-informed. They regularly change the terms, definitions and conditions of a policy, when the insured has already agreed to them, in a transparent attempt to thwart payments.

They will ask the insured for documents or to perform tasks, such as taking medicines not prescribed by their own doctors or to engage in employment in a field other than their norm, none of which are required or listed in the actual policies themselves. They will require second medical opinions from doctor's who are already on "their" payrolls. They will presume, based on testimony from questionable and unethical witnesses, specifically interviewed to corroborate the insurance company's position or case.

Col.lu.sion (n.): a secret agreement
between two or more parties for a
fraudulent, illegal, or deceitful purpose.

They stop payments with no foundation. They make constant and repetitive requests. They give no time frames for their responses to their policyholders. They pass policyholder claims around internally in yet another attempt to stall their outlay of payments. They slander and libel their policyholders without proof, specifically in court documents under the umbrella of "allegations" and then these documents, because they are court records, remain. The disability insurance industry has even gone so far as to maintain a "hit list" of policyholders singled out for special harassment.

Smoking gun (n.): something that serves
as indisputable evidence or proof,
especially of a crime.

Just prior to our credit package, we will end with our secondary theme of CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY, the idea that businesses should not function amorally, but instead should contribute to the welfare of their communities and clients, and we will offer three very different solutions to advocate for the use of an ounce of prevention and show the insurance companies that changing the way they do business, re-vamping their investigative systems, policies and procedures is actually good business.

During our credit package, we will include additional stories from the insured and additional tags from commercials whose intent is to lull you, with their warm and fuzzy footage and catchy tags, "you're in good hands with Allstate," "State Farm, like a good neighbor, is there," "get Met, it pays," into buying their policies. Problem for them is, that each will be followed with a testimonial by someone whose benefits weren't paid. We don't need to say a thing. The insurance companies' own words will be enough.

Our conclusion, then, will be leaving our viewers with information relevant to the people featured in our stories, the amount of their benefits, the length of time they were paid, etc., etc.

Donna Stebbins is our final picture and her graphics will read as follows...

Donna's benefits, if paid, amount to $537.50 per week.
Her insurance company is Fairfield Insurance.
Fairfield Insurance is a subsidiary
of Berkshire Hathaway.

The CEO of Berkshire Hathaway is Warren Buffett.

The second richest man in the world runs a company that is responsible for denying benefits to an objectively disabled woman from San Bernandino, California and because of this, she eats based on the number of cans she is able to collect in her neighborhood on any given day.

This short form subject documentary is a social issue film, that will focus on the insurance industry, using the personal stories of those individuals who have been most seriously victimized. It is crafted around people our audience will be able to empathize with and relate to, because of their troubles. After all, it could happen to any one of us, at any time...

Adjustor (n.): a person
responsible for
investigating and settling
a claim.

Bad faith (n.): intentional deception,
dishonesty, or failure to meet
an obligation or duty.
© 2007, Grand Prix Productions