Group legal plans

[sweeps]

My employer is offering a new benefit, a Group Legal Plan. Basically you have the option to pay $15/month and certain legal services are covered at no charge (creating a will, selling your primary residence, etc.). Does anyone have experience with these plans? Are they worth it?

[mjrube94]

My husband's company had the same deal with a company called ARAG(?). Basically, you need to sign up at open enrollment, then can't change your election until the next year's open enrollment, so you really have to think about whether or not you'd use the service. And you need to use a lawyer in their network, which wasn't a problem for us as there were several in the area. We signed up twice, when we knew we would be doing our initial will, and again when we were making some substantial revisions. At $15/month, that still works out to $180/year, but that's a lot less than it would have cost us for 2 wills, 2 powers of attorney, 2 living wills, and 2 health care proxies. So it's definitely worth it if you know you'll use it.

[dealsaver]

It can be a good option for your basic legal needs. I wouldn't try to use it for high stakes legal issues however.