Life Insurance - Recently deceased policy holder

Sunrise_Sunset

Life insurance company have requested a copy of the death certificate which details the cause of death. We don't have this yet, we were issued a temporary death certificate which states that the Coroner is inquiring into the cause of death. A post mortem took place, we haven't received the results yet. The funeral home advised us it could take 12-18 months to get the death certificate.

Any idea if the insurance company will accept the temporary death certificate? Maybe with other supporting documents, if we were able to get an official document of the post mortem results?

12-18 months would be an extremely long time for an elderly spouse, on a state pension, to have to wait to claim on the insurance policy. Currently very little funds to cover the cost of the funeral.

In addition, would banks require the same documents to transfer any savings to the next of kin (spouse)? Again, if the wait were to be 12-18 months this would be way too long.

dennyk

That would be a question for the insurer. Depending on the circumstances, they might accept the interim certificate, but some policies might exclude certain causes of death, so they might require an official cause of death determination before they can pay out the claim in order to verify that no policy exclusions apply.

The bank and other parties should be able to accept the interim certificate, as the cause of death is irrelevant in those cases; they should only require proof that the person in question is deceased, which the interim death certificate would provide.

Henry Ford III

I agree it's one to ask the insurer directly.

If it's a "mature" policy however (i.e. not a new one) I wouldn't expect any issues with such a claim.

coylemj

OP, if the coroner is involved and there was a post mortem, it's probably being investigated as a 'sudden death' by a local Garda Sgt. You might get the same response (12-18 months to get the death cert.) as you did from the undertaker but it might be worth asking that Garda to give you an estimate as to when the coroner might close the case and issue a death cert. The coroner has to decide if there will be an inquest and if he/she decides there will be no inquest, the case will be closed much quicker. Keep in touch with the Garda who is investigating the case as they will typically be kept up to date on the progress of the case by the coroner.

Sunrise_Sunset

I have asked the insurer. But it took 15 business days for them to get in contact after my initial contact. I then replied asking them the question as per the above and got a generic response email to say they will revert back within another 15 business days. The funeral bill is imminent and I'd like to have an idea.

The death was in hospital, however it was sudden, and the doctor called a family member to say there will be in an internal investigation into the death.

The insurance policy is old, probably around 30-40 years old. It's not a huge policy by any means, the amount has been decreasing every year, and there should only be enough now to cover funeral expenses and maybe a couple of grand left over.

Good news regarding the bank. There should be enough in that account to cover the funeral expenses in the meantime. I since found out he had received a small amount from his brothers estate in recent months.