BNY Mellon Benefits Guide
What Is a Qualified Life Event?
You may change your elections during the year if you experience one of the following qualified life event changes:
- Legal Marital Status—Events that change your legal marital status, including marriage, death, divorce, legal separation (according to state law) or annulment.
- Number of Dependents—Events that change the number of your eligible dependents, including birth, adoption, foster care, placement for adoption or death of a dependent.
- Employment Status—Events that change your employment status, or the employment status of your spouse/qualified domestic partner or dependent, including termination of employment, a strike or lockout, a start of or return from an unpaid leave of absence, a change in worksite, or any other employment status change that results in a gain or loss of eligibility under the relevant employer plan (for example, a switch from non-benefited to benefited). If your status changes from non-benefited to benefited or vice versa, your benefits costs will change.
- Loss of Coverage—You lose benefits coverage, whether due to loss of employment or another reason.
- Dependent Eligibility—Events that cause the gain or loss of a dependent's eligibility for benefits.
- Residence—A change in where you, your spouse/qualified domestic partner or dependent lives.
- Eligibility for Medicare—You may change your health plan election if becoming Medicare-eligible precludes you from participating in the health plan (e.g., a health savings account) you are enrolled in at such time.
Any election change described above can only be made if you provide notice to the plan administrator within 31 days (60 days if eligibility for coverage under Medicaid or CHIP changes) from the date of the qualified life event and only if the change corresponds to and is consistent with that event.
- the qualified life event affects eligibility for you, your spouse/qualified domestic partner or your dependent under a BNY Mellon plan or a plan maintained by your spouse's/qualified domestic partner's or dependent's employer; and
- the election change is on account of and corresponds to that qualified life event.