I was curious to know if my husband's former employer has to give us a written notification of termination of medical benefits and if so, how much notice is to be given. Also, how much notice are we to be given about paying for COBRA benefits out of our own pocket? I am 7 1/2 months pregnant without insurance now because ours was cancelled by his former employer without any written notification or the option to purchase a COBRA plan. He was employed there for 16 months. The health insurance company just sent us written notification of cancellation of benefits effective 1-31-06, the letter is dated 2-04-06, the metered mail is dated 02-07-06, it was postmarked by the USPS on 2-8-06, and we received the letter on 2-11-06

His current employer is playing games and still has not authorized my husband to get medical benefits(even though every other full time employee has them from day one). He started his position there in December 2005, which would have been within the 6 month deadline for my pregnancy to be covered.

I forgot to add that his former employer, that is now his current employer, gave us notice of COBRA benefits and costs if we needed them within 3 weeks of him leaving. They covered us for 3 months without additional out of pocket expenses. His now former employer never sent us anything like that.

His employer and/or the plan administrator between them have up to 44 days to advise you of your COBRA rights and the cost to you. They can legally cancel your insurance until they have received your first payment; however, they must reinstate your insurance retroactively so that there is no gap in coverage.

Pregnancy CANNOT be considered a pre-existing condition on ANY employer-sponsored group policy, no matter how pregnant you are when coverage begins. That is Federal law.

BTW, so is COBRA. Unless the employer has less than 50 employees, NJ has no law that would change any of the above answers.