My Stories from the Field - Chapter 6

This is the sixth post in a long sequence where I want to share stories of real people I have met either while working with a life insurance company, or as an independent investment adviser. My goal is to share their stories so I can impart the lessons I learned in the hopes that these lessons will also serve others - this is for you, my readers!
*All my subjects will be either John or Mary, for privacy reasons.

As we are approaching the holidays, and that is a time to be spent with family, I want to talk about the different obstacles that are in the way of setting up life insurance on oneself - mainly, health issues. I mentioned a few times before that there are medical conditions that determine that a person cannot qualify for life insurance - this is known as decline in insurance lingo (or even autodecline - meaning it is for sure a decline, so there is no point in event sending the info to underwriting) - and this applies to most policies. The only exception are the guaranteed insurance policies, because they do not ask any medical questions.

Growing up in Romania, I only knew of only one elderly lady who had diabetes. I had a notion of what the condition meant but didn't really understand. While working in the life insurance industry, I met quite a lot of people who had diabetes. During my 8 years with a life insurance company that put me in front of many blue-collar workers, I learned that diabetes in pretty common in the US; in my experience about 20-25% of the people I met had it or had someone in the family who had it.

In and off itself, this wasn't a huge problems for the people I met, front the standpoint of the life insurance company, since they could still qualify for policies; as long as they had the condition under control. The challenges came when the people were not as diligent with keeping it in check as they should be. I came across such cases a few times, and I had to tell them they would not be eligible for coverage. This was a tough job because it was something that they could change with a little work.

The saddest moments with this medical condition happened when I met people with type I diabetes, and especially the children of the prospects. In those cases, about 90% of the times they were declined for coverage. It was hard not being able to help. And this made me a believer in life insurance coverage on the children - despite the advice of famous people within the financial industry who preach against it.

With this said, there are rare cases when the child needs a lot of coverage - and there are specific reasons to have that in place. Most cases, I recommended some coverage in place, that would also allow for an increase at a later time, as needed, up to a certain amount, without further proof of insurability (without having to answer medical questions). This advice that I gave in the past by no means applies to every situation and every family. Each situation is different and should be treated as such - with a professional. 

My main reason for sharing this information is that I wish you would all understand the importance of taking care of your health - for many reasons, among which is the ability to protect your family in case of situations that can affect the family emotionally and financially - such as unexpected death.

Just as you cannot buy car insurance after an accident, you cannot purchase life insurance when you need it. It must be in place before you need to make a claim.

Please remember:
Always see a professional for your family's insurance needs. Just like you see a doctor to diagnose and treat your medical conditions, you should talk to an insurance professional that can review your family's needs and advise you appropriately.

My Stories from the Field - Chapter 3

This is the third post in a long sequence where I want to share stories of real people I have met either while working with a life insurance company, or as an independent investment adviser. My goal is to share their stories so I can impart the lessons I learned in the hopes that these lessons will also serve others - this is for you, my readers!
*All my subjects will be either John or Mary, for privacy reasons.

I want to spend the time today talking about the importance of getting life insurance while healthy, so that the family is taken care of, in case something happens. While working with the life insurance company, I met quite a few people who were not able to qualify for life insurance. In industry jargon this type of prospect is known as an autodecline. This means that even without sharing this info with the underwriters I was able to know that these persons were unable to qualify for life insurance.

A couple of the examples that come to mind are for single parents - a mom and a dad - both young, and both with children under 10 years old. In both cases I was unable to set in place life insurance for the parents. It was a bad feeling of inability to help them. Neither one was able to protect themselves with life insurance, and unfortunately both of them have passed away since. That was even more sad for me to find out. I had to tell their family when they called that no money was coming from the life insurance company.

I still remember meeting Mary many years ago, and she was a great baker - had the privilege to taste one of her cakes. I was sad to be in the position to tell her that because of her condition (sarcoidosis of the skin) she would be declined for life insurance. I remember she had a son - about 7-8 years old. I felt bad having to tell her that I could not help her make sure her son would be taken care of. She had just received the notification from her job that she could not have life insurance through them either, because they had changed providers and she had to go through the underwriting process.

Her medical condition stayed in my mind even though I met her about 10 years ago because it hadn't been long since Bernie Mac had died from sarcoidosis of the liver. Being a fan, this left a profound impression on me.

When I met John, I learned that he had a 5 year old son and he worked out of town - about 2 hours away - so he spent a lot of time driving up and down the highway. His medical condition didn't look too serious at the first glance. He had high blood pressure. Since I had been with the life insurance company for a number of years at the time, I already had quite a few clients with the same condition.

I remember John saying that he didn't really take care of this health but he was in his 30's, so I thought it was no big deal. I thought he still kinda sorta took care of his health. He had a son to take care of, right?! Well, I was surprised when his application came back as a decline for life insurance because his blood pressure was no way close to under control.

Some months later I received a call from his parents and found out he had passed - and not due to an accident. So I had to tell them that they had no life insurance money coming in to help with raising his child.

These situations are some of the saddest that I had to live through during my years with the life insurance company. It's hard to be unable to help people. On a logical level, I understand that it was out of my control. On an emotional level, I still wish I could have helped these families - as well as the other ones where I met people who could not qualify for life insurance.

Please remember this:
The best time to apply for life insurance is NOW. When you are healthy, it is the best time to protect yourself; once something happens, like being diagnosed with a serious medical condition or becoming terminally ill, it is too late.