Group Disability Insurance provides disability insurance coverage for eligible employees. Generally eligible employees are those employees working at least 30 hours or more. However, so long as an employee is working at least the minimum hours prescribed by the insurance carrier, the employer can determine the minimum number of hours it wishes to mandate as the hourly minimum. For example an employer could say that in order to be eligible for group benefits, an employee must be working at least 35 hours per week. STD generally covers employees for periods of time ranging from 13 weeks to 1 year with the most common benefit duration being either 13 or 26 weeks.
Disability insurance has an elimination period associated with it.
During the elimination period there is no coverage. A common elimination period for STD is 1 day for accidents and 8 days for sickness. Depending on the nature of business of an organization and other variables, the weekly maximum benefit amount will vary. It is also possible to purchase a flat benefit amount for all employees. LTD generally covers employees to age 65 depending on a persons age at the time of their disability.