Correction; Need to know if there is a way to find the company her Aunt had a life insurance policy with?
My friends Aunt is now deceased, and she told her about a policy
She did not get around to showing or telling her the name. There is no paper work in the house
for her to go on? Would she need to call every life insurance company or is there one specific place she can go to in order to locate this information?
Gem posted: 07 Aug at 4:38 pm
Canceled checks would be the first place to look, if she had insurance at some point she paid for it.
mbrcatz posted: 07 Aug at 4:55 pm
Is friend the executor or administrator of Aunt’s estate? If not, there’s NOTHING she can do. That information is protected by privacy laws.
If you’re asking, is there a database where you can plug their name in, the answer is no.
70% of Americans die without active life insurance in force, so the easiest place to start, is with whatever it is that makes you think they even HAVE life insurance.
The second easiest, is to go through the banking records. If they had insurance, they’d be paying for it, at least once a year, but usually once a month. You should see a cancelled check. If you’re executor/administrator of the estate, you can get copies of all their cancelled checks for the past year, from their bank, and go through them. Be sure to check the safety deposit box at their bank, too.
Obviously, you need to check through their valuable papers at their home.
If they were employed at the time of death, call the HR department at their employer’s, to see if there was any group life insurance.
If you suspect they had a prepaid policy, just change the mailing address to yours – if they DID have a paid up policy, once a year they’d be receiving a statement from the insurance company.
Again, if you’re executor of the estate, you can pay $75 to http://www.mib.com/html/lost-life-insurance.html and they will tell you if any applications have been received on their lives, in the past 13 years. It only goes back 13 years, and you’ll need to send them proof that you are administrator or executor of the estate.
Don’t be worried about someone else “intercepting” your life insurance money. If you are the beneficiary of the policy, the insurance money gets mailed directly to you.
If you’re not administrator or executor of the estate, AND a check doesn’t show up to your mail one day, then legally you don’t have access to the information – it’s protected by the privacy laws. But you can always ASK the administrator/executor if there is life insurance, and who the beneficiary is.
Life insurance tends to run in families. Do you have life insurance? Your sibs? Your parents? Most people TELL family members, if there is life insurance. If none of the surviving family members have any life insurance, odds are, the deceased doesn’t, either. That’s your PERSONAL reminder. Go buy life insurance, and tell at least two different family members that you have it, and where you keep your valuable papers.
rtfm posted: 07 Aug at 5:02 pm
There is no one specific place.
Does your friend have copies of her aunt’s bank statements? They ought to show a payment to the insurance company at least once a year, if not monthly.
Tom Z posted: 07 Aug at 5:13 pm
First thing I would do would be to call the insurance agent that wrote their home and auto insurance. That agent might have written a life policy or perhaps referred them to another agent.
I would also review the checkbook carefully there might be a premium payment to an insurance company. I say carefully because there might be only an annual payment. If there is no checkbook your friend can seek bank records but she would have to be the legally appointed executor.
Go through the decedents files you may find an actual policy. That, however, is no guarantee that the policy is still in force.
Check with the decedents employer (if they worked) as many employers provide life insurance as an employee benefit.
If you think that the insurance was applied for in the last 13 years you can try this link http://www.mibsolutions.com/lost-life-insurance/ it is the Medical Information Bureau’s policy locator service. Cost is $75 per search. To be eligible to submit a request you will have to be the executor of the estate, a surviving spouse or a child of the decedent. If none of these exist you may be eligible as a close family member or if you have a reasonable expectation that you would be a beneficiary…
George posted: 07 Aug at 6:07 pm
lifeinsurance.awardspace.info – try this one. I have their insurance and, as remember, they can provide such a service.
StephenWeinstein posted: 07 Aug at 6:18 pm
If she applied for the policy less than ten years ago, then you can get a list of every company where she applied in the last ten years from the Medical Information Bureau (MIB), which should considerably reduce the number of companies to contact.
If you can find a canceled check from when she paid for the insurance, it should have the company name.