Long-Term Disability

Long-term disability insurance helps ensure that employees will still receive a portion of their income when they are absent from work for an extended period due to a covered disability. These absences may result from accidents, injuries, or illnesses that happened on or off the job.

James G Parker Insurance's long-term disability strategies can help maintain productivity by helping employees stay on the job. If they do incur an illness or injury, our agency can provide the resources employees need to help them return to work as soon as they are reasonably able.

Long-term disability (or LTD) insurance provides income replacement if an employee cannot work for an extended period. These policies can offer coverage for a few years or continue until the employee reaches retirement age. While the employee can pay premiums for these plans, most LTD plans are fully paid for by the employer because of the relatively low cost and benefit to recruiting. If the company pays for the plan, it can specify features, including the length of the waiting period, benefit amount, length of coverage, and whether or not the employee can collect social security benefits while using plan coverage.

Short-Term Disability

Often working in tandem with LTD insurance, short-term disability (STD) coverage is intended to provide more immediate income replacement if an employee cannot work. STD plans are most commonly six months of coverage and have a short exclusion period before benefits begin (typically seven days). Premiums for STD plans can be employee-paid, employer-paid, or split between the two.

Employers offering STD and LTD should coordinate the coverage of the two plans (for instance, if the long-term disability plan has a six-month waiting period, the short-term disability offering should cover six months). Employers can work with their employee benefits service to decide whether employees can collect paid leave or vacation time alongside their STD benefits or whether they must have exhausted their paid leave before plan benefits begin. Disability coverage represents an inexpensive offering that can add a great deal of value to a company’s benefits package.