For more than three decades, one of America’s largest banks, JPMorgan Chase (NYSE:JPM), has refused to pay a $331 monthly pension to Elaine Silverberg, widow of one of their former employees, according to The New York Post. The publisher recently reported on the ordeal that left the widow fighting for what should be hers – a battle she has been waging for more than thirteen years.
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Elaine’s late husband, Melvyn Silverberg, worked for Chase Manhattan Bank as a systems analyst until 1979. Tragically, he passed away in 1988 aged just 43 due to multiple organ failure, leaving Elaine, who was only 37, to raise their three children. only. Since then, Melvyn’s $53,000 pension from his ten years at the bank has been in limbo for more than 36 years, while Elaine has fought to collect it in retirement.
In a statement to the New York Post, JPMorgan Chase admitted that Melvyn had earned a fixed retirement package, but claimed he had failed to complete the necessary paperwork to choose his wife as a beneficiary. Unfortunately, Mel passed away before the Retirement Equity Act of 1984, which automatically granted retirement benefits to spouses, became law. Because Mel’s employment ended before this law was passed, the bank has used this technicality to argue that Elaine is not entitled to any benefits.
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Elaine, now 73, said the company treated her like “an insignificant cockroach to be stepped on.” The bank has not backed down despite its repeated pleas and even enlisted the help of New Jersey Senator Cory Booker and former New York Congressman Eliot Engel.
According to the Social Security Administration, the pension should pay out $331 monthly, which isn’t exactly a life-changing amount for a bank that made nearly $13 billion in profits in the third quarter of this year alone.
JPMorgan Chase says they sympathize with Elaine, but cannot make an exception without the required paperwork. To make matters worse, correspondence reviewed by the newspaper shows that the bank reportedly contacted Melvyn several times after his death, including once in 1990, asking him to opt for spousal coverage – two years after he had already died.
