Outrage: Widow Loses Out on Spouse’s Insurance

When Tom Amschwand was diagnosed with sarcoma in 1999, he made sure that all of his employee benefits would remain in place despite his going on disability. Throughout his 18 months of cancer treatment, Amschwand diligently paid his employer, Spherion, $82.36 a month to keep his life insurance policy active. But more than a year after Amschwand’s 2001 death from the disease, his widow, Melissa Amschwand Bellinger, had not received a cent from her husband’s policy. No one from Spherion would return her phone calls; even the efforts of her father, an attorney, failed to bring any answers.

Why? It turns out that Spherion changed life insurance providers while Amschwand was ill. He requested a copy of the new policy numerous times but was told that it wasn’t ready yet and that he shouldn’t worry. Amschwand never saw the policy, which his widow received a year after his death. And only then did Bellinger discover that the new policy contained a clause requiring employees to work at least one day during the policy period in order for it to be active, which Amschwand had not done.

Bellinger, 37, of Missouri City, Texas, sued Spherion, seeking the $426,000 value of the policy. But she lost and was able to recoup only the premiums Amschwand paid, totaling less than $5,000. In June the U.S. Supreme Court declined to take her case.

Despite being in treatment, Amschwand could have worked the one day required, if only he had known, Bellinger says. But without a copy of the policy, he had no reason to believe that Spherion wouldn’t honor the policy when the time came.

“If this can happen to my Tommy, this can happen to anyone,” Bellinger says. “You shouldn’t have to watch your back that carefully. When you pay for something and you have a contract, you shouldn’t have to fight for it.”

For its part, Spherion insists in a statement that it made every effort to work with the Amschwand family. Calls to a company representative were not returned.

Michelle Diament, who writes frequently for the Bulletin’s In the News section, lives in Memphis, Tenn.