Joshua H.
The Last Thing You Need While on Medical Leave
HORRIFIC experience. I genuinely do not understand how a company responsible for people who are sick, injured, or on medical leave can operate this way. My experience was bizarre from the very first phone call. The representative actually told me she “knew why I was in trouble at work.” Excuse me? I WASN’T IN TROUBLE AT WORK. I was calling because I needed medical leave. Imagine being emotionally exhausted, filing for short-term disability, and having the person assigned to help you casually invent a workplace problem you don’t have. Unfortunately, it got worse from there. Communication has been terrible. I have repeatedly had to chase them for basic answers about when medical records were received, when they were actually sent for review, what was happening with my claim, when a decision would be made, and when I would be paid. Information comes in pieces, timelines change, and getting a direct answer feels unnecessarily difficult. They even called me DURING THERAPY. I answered and asked if the representative could call me back 15 minutes later when my appointment ended. Nope. Apparently the company administering my mental-health-related disability leave couldn’t accommodate me finishing therapy. You cannot make this stuff up. The most exhausting part is that I went on leave because of burnout and emotional exhaustion, yet I have had to spend an unbelievable amount of energy managing the company that is supposed to be managing my leave. If you are dealing with Reliance Matrix, document EVERYTHING. Dates, emails, calls, medical records, who said what, and when they said it. A person on disability leave should not have to become the claims examiner, project manager, auditor, and escalation department for their own claim. Absolutely horrific experience.

