Claiming on very old Life Insurance (Updated - conflicting information)

2013yearofthehouse

UPDATED - see post #5


I know absolutely nothing about life insurance, so please bear with me

My grandfather died years ago, but I received a letter trying to trace him and realised he had life insurance. It appears no one dealt with it at the time of his death (I was a child at the time). My mum (his daughter-in-law) gave me a box of old paperwork, that she had never been through (she would have only got it herself years after his death, kept it to give to me as an adult, but then forgot about it) and I found the payment books and certificate.

It appears he started paying about 50p every week in 1950s and then it varied a bit over the years, up to £8 every few months, until his death in 2005. The certificate says Whole Life Assurance with profits and with periodical endowments every five years.

I sent the Insurance Company a death certificate in response to the trace letter and they have sent me a cheque for about £400.

Does that sound about right? They have given no explanation, just this is your claim amount for policy xxxxxx and like I say I have no clue about insurance. I did search a bit for info online and it seems these policies weren't really worth having and payout is supposed to be low and often not even as much as was paid in. Is that right?

Sorry for being so clueless!

McKneff

Is your father around, or any siblings of his.

2013yearofthehouse

McKneff wrote: »

Is your father around, or any siblings of his.

My father was an only child and he died when I was a baby.

McKneff

I was thinking of the intestacy laws but no problem .

This happened to me, my father had a small policy , which was never claimed and i ended up with about £400.

i donated some to SSAFA, who had helped out our family many years ago,
Said a mental 'thanks' to my dad and treated the family to something special

Get it spnt and enjoy xx

Annie

2013yearofthehouse

Thank you for your reply

I have received a letter today (dated 9th March - the cheque was dated 13th March) saying your claim is being dealt with and you will receive the cheque separately (so obviously this letter was supposed to arrive first, which would have made me less confused!). It says they have added interest because of the delay and have included a tax voucher showing the interest and tax payable. Do I need to do anything with that? Just keep it? Says the tax has been paid direct to HMRC.

This would all be fine.....sorted, finished etc......except.....

I received another letter today (different envelope, but from same department, same contact details etc. Although neither letter is signed by anyone), also dated 13th March, that says unfortunately your last email is all I received without any policy numbers or information on it, so I am unable to trace any business with your grandfather. Please confirm that he had a policy with us, confirm the policy number, complete the claim form [which is included, along with a return envelope] and return along with a death certificate.

I should probably explain (left this out the OP for simplicity) - when I received the trace letter, I called them, but was told there was no record of my grandfather or any of his addresses (even though obviously there should have been - at least the one where they had just sent a letter to or the one where collections had been made for 20+ years). They basically said that I must be mistaken, but that I could try writing a letter to them instead, so I sent a letter and death certificate in response to the trace letter, expecting them to send me a claim form or to write to me in some way, but didn't hear anything for months. I then received another trace letter, so thought there must be a record of my grandfather otherwise why keep trying to trace him (I also wondered whether maybe they just hadn't received the letter/certificate, as this would explain the no reply in months). So rather than risk another letter, I emailed them, telling them I had sent a death certificate in response to a trace letter. Again I was expecting some kind of claim form or letter in the post or reply to my email asking for more information, but I got an email saying they had the death certificate on record (which suggests they also had the letter I sent, which had all the other info to fill in the blanks), sorry for the delay, payment will be sent and then that's when the cheque turned up on Tuesday and the other letters today.

Have they just got their wires mixed up somewhere in the same department? Do I ignore the claim form or fill it in? Email them and try to explain? I don't want to do anything wrong, but I don't want to cause anymore confusion either!

It sounds to me like someone has read my email and had the same reaction as the person on the phone months ago did - no record, a mistake etc. but rather than replying telling me to write a letter, they have send out generic claim form. Then thankfully someone else has looked at my same email and found the record, along with death certificate, so has processed the claim. Although given the dates on the letters, they actually suggest it was the other way round! Someone processed the claim on 9th and then someone issued the claim form on 13th!