All insurance guide

While insurance companies are responsible for paying all legitimate insurance claims, unfortunately some unscrupulous insurance companies will use unfair claims practices in an effort to lowball your claim settlement or to provoke an outright claim denial.

When unfair claims practices overtake the duties of an insurance company, consumers must become vigilant right from the beginning of the claim. Use the following insurance claim help tips to your advantage.

Providing a recorded statement

When dealing with your own insurance company, your insurance claim is known as a first party claim. The “duties” clause of your insurance policy compels you to cooperate and to provide a recorded statement if asked. If you refuse to cooperate, it will almost always result in a justified claim denial.

A third party claim occurs when you have filed an insurance claim with an adverse, liability carrier. In this case, you are not bound to cooperate, as you have no contractual relationship with this company. Nonetheless, it should be to your advantage to cooperate fully, and to comply with reasonable information requests. Unless you sense biased, unfair claims practices.

In an environment of unfair claims practices, recorded statements can be used as a means used by unscrupulous insurance companies to place faulty “red flags” in your claim, subjecting it to unfair delays, to a lower claim settlement, or as a means to enable a claim denial.

Let’s assume that you provided a statement immediately following your report of the loss. This is a common practice with insurance companies requiring their adjusters to make contact within 24 hours. And this is a good thing. But in the case of an unscrupulous insurance company while this perceived customer service may seem impressive at first glance, consider how the timing could be used to your disadvantage.

An insurance claim is the result of a loss. It is stressful and difficult. Is it not possible, that in the immediate aftermath of your loss that the details might be sketchy, or even unknown. Is it fair to pin you down, to commit you to details that you might not even know about? Is it reasonable that you might not fully understand the extent of your injuries or the precise degree of your damages?

Most states have adopted good faith insurance standards which prohibit insurance companies from demanding statements when an insured is under duress. And, in the case of reasonable insurance investigations, “conflicts” are not regarded as “red flags”, but rather as a reflection of the dynamic nature of insurance claims.

In the case of a first party claim, while you have the obligation to fully cooperate, there could be certain situations where you could legitimately delay a recorded statement. Complications from injuries would be one example. A second example – you are in the process of seeking an attorney to represent you. In the end, however, you must comply with the request for a recorded statement or face a near certain claim denial.

Clearly, unfair claims practices that include intentional misrepresentation of your recorded statement represent the worst of bad faith claims handling. Nonetheless, these tactics persist. Only through knowledge of the events themselves and the proper response to the event, can consumers hope to prevail in an unfair insurance dispute.

Consider these basic insurance claim help tips if you sense you might be the victim of unfair insurance practices.

Become an active player in the settlement of your insurance claim

You must maintain courteous and persistent contact with your adjuster.

Beware of the unexplained, “ongoing investigation”. Your adjuster is responsible for informing you of the general nature of your claim delay. Always seek to determine the exact reason for the delay. This should give you a good insight into whether the delay is reasonable or not. Even if you are unable to secure the specific reasons for the delay, always inquire what you might accomplish to expedite your claim settlement.

Always document all contacts with the adjuster, focusing on your willingness to cooperate and to provide any further information that could resolve the delay.

Recognize that in order to triumph, to achieve a fair claim settlement, you must be proactive, and you must refuse to transfer your power to the insurance company. Those who do are far more likely to suffer the negative effects of unfair claims practices.

Perhaps the title of the article may appear confusing to many, as they might be under the impression that these two words have nothing in common and rather represent two totally different ideas or thinking.

It was quite true in India few years back when the insurance industry was not opened to foreign investors and financial reforms have not been implemented. In pre reform era there was only one Life Insurance Company in India – LIC- Life Insurance Corporation of India. It had a monopoly in this industry and the government support and backing.

Being the only player in the market, there was nothing special in the kinds of policies – as a product. Whatever was available, at whatever price and in whatever form- was sold and purchased? It has no alternative and customers were compelled to purchase those products.

In those days particularly long term plans, life term plans – known as term policies or whole life policies were mainly sold by LIC. It had a peculiar term ranging from 20-35 years. The only specialty of LIC plans was that they were available at meager cost, very low monthly installments etc. They were quite within the reach of a common man. So people purchased them not with great intention, but for having some insurance cover or in many cases even not knowing the reason of purchasing. It was just a one aspect of saving some money, without any thinking of return on it.

Naturally as insurance was never thought as an investment avenue, no one expected great returns on it. People were happy with whatever 6 -7% returns they got over the span of 20-35 years. Therefore insurance has never been considered as an investment option in India till recently.

Financial Reforms in India, including insurance reforms opened doors to foreign investors and Indian Market was flooded with number of experienced, developed, world known insurance players from the world.

This reform process has greatly benefited the Indian customers in various ways. Completely new types of plans, tested worldwide were made available to them. The competition in the market improved the customer service of LIC out of business compulsions. Availability of multiple products made them possible to compare the benefits and cost structure, which was unknown for them up till now. Before insurance reforms hardly anyone known the cost involved in LIC policies, and no one bothered about it also.

The main changing factor was the introduction of unit linked policies. These are the new products, wherein people can think of earning more returns, even more than the fixed deposit rates of the nationalized banks in India in medium to long term plans. As unit linked policies offer higher return, naturally it involves greater risk also. However, no one can think of high return without any risk. Those are related to share market and high fluctuations and volatility in it also affects the valuation of the units – called as NAV- net asset value. However experience teaches that in spite of cost and risk involved in it, it offer higher return to the Investor. Investor can look to insurance policy as a way of earning higher return, as an investment avenue. It can be easily included in investment portfolio of common man.

ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company, the leading and Number One private insurance company, since its inception, has maintained its lead in the industry in India due to its best’s products, efficient service, customer friendly approach, wise investment policy and so many other factors. Insurance policy holders of ICICI Prudential Life Insurance have been rewarded with high and reliable returns. Therefore today in India now even the common man’s idea of looking towards insurance is also changing. It is not only considered as coverage of risk of death but also appreciation of premium paid over the term during life, so that he can enjoy benefit of insurance policy during life. There is no use of it to proposer after his death.

So ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Policies are giving convincing high return for enjoyment during life time – ” Enjoy Wealth created during the Life Time“