Cobra eligibility upon retiree health plan termination ?

[Guest DBPension]

Assume an employee is entitled to 18 months of COBRA upon retirement at age 60, and that the empolyee's spouce and child (both previously dependents in the health plan before the employee's retirement) are also entitled to Cobra. A few questions:

(1) Are the spouce & child entitled to 18 or 36 months of COBRA ... I seem to recall that it might be 36?

(2) Am I correct that the employee is only entitled to 18 months of COBRA?

(3) Now the tough question ..... Assume the employer has a roughly 50% subsidized (but frozen $ subsidy) retiree health plan which can be taken in lieu of Cobra, but that the retiring employee does NOT (per the Retiree health Plan Documents) have the option to FIRST take Cobra and THEN switch to the subsidized Retiree Health plan. Also assume that the retiree decides to go with the Retiree healh plan (because he needs health coverage to age 65 .... longer than can be provided via Cobra). Then suppose that (say) 6 months after he retires (having entered the Retiree health plan) that the employer unilaterally ENDS the RETIREE health plan (but not the health care plan for those still employed). Must the employer offer the retiree and his dependents Cobra at that time ..... keeping in mind that he has only had 6 moths of post-retirement health coverage so far, far shorter than that he could have taken under Cobra? If the ENDING of a retiree health plan does NOT trigger eligibility for Cobra (especially when the ending of the plan is shortly after retirement), it appears that this could be a way for unscrupulous employers to skirt their Cobra obligation.

If there is no legal obligation of the employer to offer Cobra in this situation, is anyone aware of litigation, regulations, etc. addressing this situation ?

Thanks.

[oriecat]

(1) Are the spouce & child entitled to 18 or 36 months of COBRA ... I seem to recall that it might be 36?

If they remain covered as dependents under the plan, they get the same 18 months of COBRA as the employee. The additional 18 months only begin to apply if for some reason they are no longer eligible as dependents, but moved to their own plan, such as death, divorce, or loss of eligibility due to dependents age. This would need to be an official second Qualifying Event.

(2) Am I correct that the employee is only entitled to 18 months of COBRA?

Yes. The only extension of time available to the employee is the Social Security Disability extension.

As for (3), no idea. I don't have to deal with retiree plans at all.