FORT WORTH – Data Marketing Partnership (DMP) has asked the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Fort Worth Division, to stop the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) and Eugene Scalia, Secretary of the Department of Labor, from preventing the company from treating its limited partnership (LP) health-benefit program as a single-employer program.
Last week, the U.S. Department of Labor issued an advisory opinion that Data Marketing Partnership’s LP Management health-benefit programs would not qualify as single-employer group health plans, or Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA)-qualified plans. In response, the plaintiffs seek to put a hold on the Department of Labor’s actions, until the District Court can rule on the case.
“Bureaucrats at the Department of Labor ignored precedence, misstated facts, and put more than 50,000 people at risk of losing their health coverage in an attempt to preserve the status quo of Obamacare, which isn’t working for everyone,” said Alex Renfro, attorney for the plan sponsor and requestor of the advisory opinion. “We are looking for ways to expand good, affordable health care to people who were left behind by Obamacare and we hope the court will do the same and prevent DOL from taking health insurance away from these people.”
Data Marketing Partnership created a single-employer, self-insured group plan, offered to DMP employees and limited partners, as well as spouses and family members, and argues that because DMP is the only sponsor of the plan, it should qualify as a single-employer, self-insured health plan.
This is not the first lawsuit Data Marketing Partnership has filed against the Department of Labor on this topic. In October 2019, the company filed after getting no response for a request for an Advisory Opinion on the matter.
“Americans who have been priced out of Obamacare and are ineligible for subsidies are desperate to find an affordable alternative that provides good, quality health coverage,” said Renfro. “This solution works for many people and is entirely compliant with ERISA. We are confident that the court will agree.”