Well, I have another ‘what not to do in business’ post. In December, CO&P was making great strides in winning new work and decided they would offer all the employees insurance. I was asked if I’d like insurance and of course I said yes. Our insurance agent is 
Carl C. Schuessler, Jr. at BenefitStrategies, LLC. The CO&P employ handling our insurance said he would ask Carl for the forms. December 15 rolled around and I still didn’t have any forms so I asked what was going on and was told that Carl was ‘working on it’. On 12/20, I received an overview of the insurance plans and was told that Carl was still working on getting me the actual insurance forms. Really? It takes weeks just to get the forms to fill out??
On 12/22, I finally received the forms which I promptly completed and returned to him the same day. Carl sent an email saying he would submit the paperwork and I would have insurance as of 01/01/12. Well, 01/01/12 rolled around, then 01/09/12 rolled around, 01/16/12 rolled around, 01/23/12 rolled around — still no insurance card or any other form of communication. On 01/23/12, I went to the Aetna site thinking I maybe the cards were lost in the mail. I entered my SSN and was told my account did not exist. I sent Carl an email asking what was going on and saying that I needed insurance in order to make several doctor appointments. His response was ‘will do’.
Of course, no other response from Carl on Monday so on Tuesday I sent an email saying that if I didn’t get cards today, then I was going to hop on my husband’s insurance because I couldn’t wait any longer. He said that there should be a resolution today. Of course, it is 11:43pm and I’ve heard nothing from Carl.
My guess is that he never turned in my paperwork, as promised in December, so I have been uninsured this whole time thinking I had insurance. This is a really big deal to me, but Carl doesn’t seem concerned at all. Of course, I’m sure he would express more concern if it were him or his family.
I am posting this story to warn anyone who might be in the market for insurance in Atlanta to stay away from Carl Schuessler, Jr and BenefitStrategies is you want to actually be insured.
As for me, I’m getting coverage through my husband’s employer.
