AIG said we let my husband's term insurance lapse which we have been paying on for 23 years. But the truth of the matter is, we didn't cancel the policy, and it wasn't that we couldn't make the payments. The issue is, we get a bill once per year, and on two occasions, a few years apart, we did not receive a bill. Since I pay bills when they come in, I missed a payment the first time after (about twenty years of steady money infusion), and they sent a grace period reminder. I sent money in right away. (This policy takes the money I pay in and applies it monthly to the term insurance premium. If the funding runs low, they advise me and I send more money.)
This second time, I did not receive a bill from them, and no grace period notification, no registered letter, no e-mail notification. But the letter I DID receive said the policy had already lapsed!!! Over and done with! If we wanted re-instatement, fill out this form and send it in with money.
Sounds okay, right? But they wanted all kinds of health questions answered and the name of my husband's doctor. Now they get to evaluate him all over again to decide if they want to reinstate him!!! How many people are in the same great health at 63 as they were at 40? This is a really rotten way of getting rid of people who have developed any health issues. They get to keep approximately $35,000 worth of premiums and tell us, "Oh well, you just don't qualify anymore".
What gives them the right to re-evaluate a person after 23 years of premiums? And to top it off, my husband has NO life-threatening conditions! No heart problems, no respiratory problems, no high blood pressure, no cancer. He does have a kidney stone, (big deal), an enlarged prostate, (what 63 year-old guy doesn't?), and a nerve condition that makes his hands and wrists weak, (an inconvenience, but by no means will it kill him), arthritis in his back and a touch of IBS.
We get to register a complaint, but they have the right to ignore it.
What about our $35,000? We get NOTHING to show for it? And their customer service can't even give you answers, you can't talk to anyone of importance, and none of their correspondence gives you anyone's name to appeal to. It's like trying to communicate with the Wizard of Oz!
Be aware, this big gristmill of the insurance industry will try to eat you up and spit you out without blinking an eye. They don't care anything about you as a customer. It will no doubt take the Attorney General and the Insurance Board to get involved to get a rise out of them. And then, who knows? There is no way we could afford to apply for new insurance at my husban's curren age of 63 years old! Think about it. This could happen to anyone.
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