Sandra Greaver of West Virginia has filed bad faith insurance lawsuit against Unum Life Insurance Company of America for allegedly trying to get out of paying her long-term disability payments.

Unum is one of the largest providers of long-term disability insurance. Disability insurance is a form of insurance, which is supposed to cover a policyholder if he or she is ever unable to work, by providing income.

However, Greaver’s lawsuit alleges that Unum has denied her insurance policy in bad faith. Bad faith is a legal term that means one party in a contract, such as an insurance policy, is trying to illegally get out of the terms of their contract. Several Unum lawsuits, including class action lawsuits, have alleged that Unum has used a variety of tactics to avoid paying out on long-term disability insurance policies.

Unum initially approved Greaver’s disability insurance claim. From 2005 to 2012 the insurance company made regular payments to the West Virginia woman, the Unum lawsuit explains. However, in February 2012, Unum claimed that Greaver was no longer disabled according to the terms of the insurance policy.

Previous Unum class action lawsuits have alleged that Unum employees have used tactics like having in-house physicians declare policyholders to be “non-disabled,” or giving denial quotas to insurance agents to discourage them from approving legitimate insurance claims.

Greaver’s Unum lawsuit asserts that she has exhausted Unum’s internal appeals process. This is potentially critical, because federal insurance law in the United States holds that an individual must try and work through the insurance company’s internal appeals process before seeking civil action like a lawsuit.

In the past, some of the Unum lawsuits have taken the form of class action lawsuits. Class action lawsuits are a type of group lawsuits, in which a group of people allege that they have all suffered similar injuries at the hands of the same defendant.

Previous class action lawsuits against Unum have alleged systemic denials of legitimate claims. However, Unum lawsuits may also take the form of individual lawsuits on behalf of those with allegedly-wrongfully-denied disability insurance claims.

The Unum lawsuit is Sandra L. Greaver v. Unum Life Insurance Company of America, Civil Action No. 1:14-cv-44 (Keeley), filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia at Clarksburg.