Private hire taxi insurance.

Jones144

My brother has been a private hire taxi driver for around 10yrs. I was hoping to find out whether his taxi insurance cover would usually include life insurance cover as standard.  He passed away very recently and had no provision to cover his funeral / burial expenses, he died suddenly without any known health issues at the age of 59. He wasn't married and had no children.  We don't believe he had any life cover insurance or any company pension entitlement from previous employment!  Our only hope is that his taxi insurance might have automatically included life cover!!  Any advice would be appreciated.

JGB1955

His taxi insurance would only cover his vehicle.  Sorry if that's not the answer you wanted but, for your peace of mind, ask his insurance company.  If his estate is insolvent you need to think about stepping back and allowing him a Public Health Funeral - otherwise whoever starts arranging things with the funeral director will be liable for the whole cost.

(I speak as the wife of an ex-PHV owner)

Marcon

Jones144 said:

My brother has been a private hire taxi driver for around 10yrs. I was hoping to find out whether his taxi insurance cover would usually include life insurance cover as standard.  He passed away very recently and had no provision to cover his funeral / burial expenses, he died suddenly without any known health issues at the age of 59. He wasn't married and had no children.  We don't believe he had any life cover insurance or any company pension entitlement from previous employment!  Our only hope is that his taxi insurance might have automatically included life cover!!  Any advice would be appreciated.

He won't have any life cover from previous employment (it's also known as death in service - i.e. you have to be in employment at the time you die for any payout to be made), but if he was an employee in recent years, it's not impossible that he has pension benefits somewhere. If you know who his previous employers were, it is certainly worth writing to them to ask. Make sure you include as much info as you can (which may be little or nothing) about dates of employment; and definitely include his full name, date of birth and NI number.