Maine: Employer Allowed Retroactive Credit for Portion of Payments Made While Claimant Received Social Security Benefits

In a case of first impression within the jurisdiction, a divided Maine Supreme Judicial Court held that the “coordination of benefits” provision in the state’s Workers’ Compensation Act, 39-A M.R.S. § 221(1) entitles an employer to a credit against ongoing incapacity benefit payments for overpayments made in the past while the employer was also receiving Social Security retirement benefit payments. The majority considered, but disregarded, the claimant’s argument that due to language in the statute referring to “the same time period,” the employer should not be entitled to a retroactive credit and chose instead to follow the employer’s argument that a credit should be allowed for the period when the employer was liable for incapacity benefits and for which the employee received Social Security retirement benefits, regardless of when the incapacity payments were made, thus entitling the employer to a retroactive credit.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis Advance.

See Urrutia v. Interstate Brands Intern’l, 2018 ME 24, 2018 Me. LEXIS 23 (Feb. 8, 2018)

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 131.05.

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law