Wells Fargo Fires Man, Daughter Dies Due To No Insurance
Yovany Gonzalez's Wells Fargo Lawsuit Alleges Bank Fired Him, Cut Dying Daughter's Health Insurance
Wells Fargo allegedly fired an employee because his dying daughter needed expensive cancer treatment, according to a lawsuit filed in Palm Beach County Court on Thursday.
Wells Fargo fired mortgage consultant Yovany Gonzalez three days before his daughter Mackenzie was scheduled to get cancer surgery in August of 2010, the lawsuit states. According to the suit, the hospital canceled the surgery because Mackenzie no longer was covered by health insurance. She died of cancer in March of 2011.
Before Gonzalez was fired, Wells Fargo and United Health Care, the health insurer, asked Gonzalez's wife "numerous questions" about Mackenzie's treatment and made "several references ... to the costs of her treatment," the lawsuit states. Around that time, Gonzalez's supervisor told Gonzalez that Wells Fargo was looking for reasons to get rid of him, according to the lawsuit.
"This was a loss of an innocent child's life," Jack Scarola, Gonzalez's lawyer, told The Huffington Post. "There were [some] Wells Fargo employees who not only lacked compassion but seemed to have been motivated by entirely improper concerns about finances."
Wells Fargo, for its part, is defending itself against the allegations. "While we're very sympathetic to Mr. Gonzalez for his personal loss, his termination was unrelated to the allegations included in the lawsuit," said Bridget Braxton, a spokesperson for Wells Fargo, in a statement. "We intend to vigorously defend the matter in court. We support and value our team members and our employment practices are in alignment with that focus."
Wells Fargo claimed to fire Gonzalez because he allegedly had falsified his time records, according to the lawsuit. But his supervisor had input the time records and said it was fine that he could not always remember the exact hours he worked, the lawsuit says. After Mackenzie was diagnosed with cancer in December of 2008, Gonzalez started working in other locations because of her cancer treatment.
The lawsuit details that Wells Fargo also did not give Gonzalez information about how to continue his family's life insurance coverage -- information he was promised after he was fired, leading to the expiration of his plan. The coverage included life insurance on the lives of his children, according to the lawsuit. As a result, Gonzalez's life insurance policy expired before Mackenzie died, and Gonzalez was not able to receive life insurance compensation for Mackenzie's death.
While you are entitled to extend your employer health insurance coverage under the COBRA law if you lose your job, as long as you pay the full premium, it took more than 90 days for Wells Fargo to send Gonzalez information about how to extend his health insurance policy under COBRA, said paralegal Walter Stein, who is helping represent Gonzalez.
A charity eventually paid for Gonzalez's premium on his behalf so that he could get a year of health insurance coverage under COBRA, Stein said.
Gonzalez started working in 2007 for Wachovia, which Wells Fargo bought in 2008 during the financial crisis. He now is working at Chase Bank for less pay than he could earn with securities registration, according to the lawsuit. The suit says Chase is not letting Gonzalez sell securities because of the reasons that Wells Fargo gave for firing him.
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Welp? What do you ladies think? Unfortunate coincidence or did they seriously screw this man and his family over?
(If this has been posted before, I apologize. I couldn't find any posts about this.)
there are so many discrepencies in this article...
unless they fired him on the very last day of the month his insurance was covered until the end of the month.
it wasnt Wells Fargo who was calling the wife for med info it was United Health Care.. it costs WF the same amount of money to insure a family of 3 if they use the ins or if they dont.
Also if you know that your child needs life or death medical treatment, then who would just sit around waiting for them to send you info.
it seems like (yes sad he lost the life of his child) but he is looking for monitary retribution because he is bitter he was fired and because he realizes he failed his DD by not being proactive.
the fact that WF has "allowed" it to get this far, shows they have done NOTHING wrong.
I know that COBRA is retroactive, but it shouldn't take more than a week to get him enrolled IMO. I wonder why someone from billing at the hospital didn't verify that he would be applying for COBRA.
So why didn't he take her to St. Judes, where no child is left untreated.
Also, there is a period of time after termination of your employment where they have to keep insurance going. For thirty days or so.
I think he did something else and got fired for it, and now, I think he's trying to cash in. I'm sorry his daughter died, but I know for a fact that Ronald McDonald House, St. Judes, and all children's hospitals would have helped that little girl.
Quoting rfurlongg:
I think there is more to the story than the what the article shares.
My DH had United through his former employer. When DH lost his job, we had coverage for 30days.
We never had any problems with United. I wish his new employer had United rather than Blue Cross/Blue Shield.
Quoting sherry132:So why didn't he take her to St. Judes, where no child is left untreated.
Also, there is a period of time after termination of your employment where they have to keep insurance going. For thirty days or so.
I think he did something else and got fired for it, and now, I think he's trying to cash in. I'm sorry his daughter died, but I know for a fact that Ronald McDonald House, St. Judes, and all children's hospitals would have helped that little girl.
Actually it isn't true that any employer has to extend benefits after a termination. My former employer paid our insurance benefits and then my share was taken out of my wages. My policy started before actually paid for it. Therefor I was repaying the school for the benefits extended to me.
Kind of like Romney caused the woman to die of cancer?
Vocal anti gay marriage, award winning far right historian kills himself inside Notre-Dame Cathedral
- slashteddy
on Aug. 10, 2012 at 5:47 AM