A couple of years ago, Lincoln National was offering some policy holders the opportunity to receive an “Enhanced Cash Surrender Value” if they surrendered their life insurance policies within a specific time frame. A few weeks before this was widely known, we began to receive letters from the carrier, along with a Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) brochure explaining the offer.The offer is not unlike offers [...]
Sally Wylie, a retiree living on an island in Maine, was stunned when her long-term care (LTC) policy premium almost doubled. According to the Wall Street Journal article that recounted her dilemma, the one-time learning specialist took on part-time work to help with the finances, and she and her husband cut back on expenses to afford the premium for the policy that was purchased to [...]
The answer is an emphatic NO. Some permanent life insurance policies, specifically guaranteed universal life (GUL) and Whole Life (WL), have required premiums, though WL out of pocket premiums can be reduced by dividends, paid-up addition cash values or policy loans. But the premium paid is not the actual cost of the policy and finding the underlying costs on the policies is a challenge. For [...]
The acting Superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services, reacting to almost "1,400" complaints from in-state consumers, recently issued an alert about universal life policies that provided insight for any trustee managing universal life policies. The alert focused on flexible premium universal life policies without secondary death benefit guarantees. As pointed out in the publication, universal life is meant to be a [...]
Back in November, we wrote about the possible “squashing” of “investors’ hopes for unlimited returns using life insurance.” At that time, the government of the Canadian province of Saskatchewan altered the regulations for a specific universal life insurance policy that some investors had hoped would be their pot of gold. However, the regulation change did not affect a court case that has since settled in [...]
In February of 2017 we reported John Hancock had placed restrictions on certain inforce illustrations. At that time, we mentioned this was a possible precursor to a cost of insurance increase. A year later the carrier notified the New York Department of Financial Services that it would be raising the cost of insurance (COI) on some Performance UL policies. Last month we reported the first [...]
In February of 2017 we reported John Hancock had placed limitations on inforce ledgers for certain Performance UL policies. A year later, in February of this year, we wrote that The Life Settlements Report, a trade publication, reported that John Hancock had voluntarily notified the state of New York that it would be raising the cost of insurance (COI) on 1,700 Performance UL policies. Today, [...]
On April 19th, a class action lawsuit was brought in the Southern District of New York against PHL Variable Life Insurance Company (Phoenix) for subjecting policyholders “to an unlawful and excessive cost of insurance (“COI”) increase” …“in violation of their insurance policies.” We reported on the cost increase in August of last year. A 2010-11 COI increase resulted in a 2015 settlement against Phoenix for [...]
In the summer of 2017 we posted a blog about another Transamerica cost of insurance (COI) rate increase affecting Ultra 115 and TransSurvivorship products purchased in 1998-99. We anticipated that the increases would be around 58%—a hefty raise. What we are seeing now could easily surpass that. We are now beginning to receive notices of monthly deduction rate increases for some policies. Some of the [...]
During an ITM TwentyFirst University webinar on trustee liability, I described a replacement case that came into our remediation department. A grantor with a whole life contract in his trust had decided to stop gifting. His agent advised him to complete a 1035 exchange of the cash value from the existing policy into a new current assumption policy. The exchange, with no other premium, would [...]
