Miss-sold Accidental Death insurance instead of Life Insurance

SamWoo5

Hi All
I would be really appreciative of some advice please.

My Dad passed away a few years ago now from Cancer , when we found out he was terminal we began to make sure his affairs were in order. My Dad was the type of man who always bought the extra guarantee with anything .
When we went to the bank to discuss his finances they told him that instead of having an "Accidental death" policy and a " Life insurance policy" that he in fact had TWO "Accidental death" policies instead ! They were very dismissive in the fact that "sometimes these things can happen" !
My Dad was so embarrassed and in shock that there was no Life insurance . He'd spent years paying in to these policies and upped the amount a few times so that my brother and I would be looked after in the event of his death.
I was amazed that the bank could have allowed such a mistake to happen.
We didn't do anything at the time as my Dad got so ill so quickly , it was the last thing on my mind.
My family feel like it's time I looked into the problem as it seems wrong that this was allowed to happen.
Any advice I would appreciate so much.
Thank you

EdGasket

I guess ultimately it was your Dad's responsibilty to read the T&C's of what he had bought and made sure it met his needs. No-one is going to retrospectively instate life assurance after the subject of such insurance has died; it'd be like saying 'here you are have £100K' or whatever amount you think should have been insured.
Sorry but realistically you won't get anywhere with this however unfair it seems.

Quentin

The premium for the 2 policies will be much less than had he bought what you say he wanted!


Thus he had more money to spend or save!

Aretnap

EdGasket wrote: »

I guess ultimately it was your Dad's responsibilty to read the T&C's of what he had bought and made sure it met his needs.

That would depend on when he bought it, and whether or not it was an advised sale.

AIUI if he chose the product himself, eg buying it over the internet, then it is indeed his responsibility to check that the product is suitable for his needs. However if he took advice from, eg, a mortgage broker or financial adviser, then the adviser has a responsibility to ensure that the product is suitable for the client's needs, and if the client was not correctly advised he could potentially pursue a claim for mis-selling, and at least get his premiums back, if not the full amount of the cover.

That's the regulations as they stand now - if he bought the policies many years ago the regulations at the time may have been less strict.

So it might be worth looking into precisely how he bought the policies, and when.

If it's a few years since he dies then you'd have to check

dunstonh

Accidental death insurance is sold differently to life assurance. It tends to be sold via leaflets, mailshots or adverts. Not via an advice process. Whereas life assurance from banks is under an advice process and is a longer process which includes a shortfall analysis, recommendation and implementation.

Banks have frequently given away accidental death insurance as a bolt on or added extra or even an incentive for people signing up for something else.

Any advice I would appreciate so much.

A complaint is an allegation of wrongdoing. So, if you are going to make a complaint about the sale of the policies you need to know how they were sold. If they involved a member of staff selling them, who was present at the sale to be able to support the allegations you are going to make?

You cant just complain that he had accidental death policies but should have had life assurance. That will get nowhere. There has to have been something done wrong by someone.

SamWoo5

Thank you so much for taking time to reply everyone

ThinkingOutLoud_2

This won't help change anything, BUT it is or was very common for people to buy accidental death policies, not realising that it only covered death in the event of an accident.

It seems odd when you look back now - but a lot of this was sold over the phone and people heard "a big lump sum if you die" and not last bit "...die in an accident". The low premiums and big lumps sums made it sound very attractive I suspect.

As others said, he had the cover he was paying for and life insurance cover would have been a lot more expensive.

I guess it will be hard to know whether the sale was misleading and or to do anything now.

So I think you have the right line of acceptance and I hope your family grasp this.