3 steps to take if you are declined life insurance 2023

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3 steps to take if you have been declined life insurance 2023

Being declined life insurance is never a positive experience, I know. I was declined life insurance by all but two insurers 12 or so years ago.

Life insurance declines are often linked to specific risks. This could be straight from application and mean that the insurer’s systems are immediately saying no.

Some examples of these are:

Health – BMI higher than 40, ongoing cancer treatment (except tamoxifen!), a heart attack within the last 6 months
Occupation – armed forces due to go on active duty, maritime security depending upon location
Travel – Russia, Ukraine, Somalia

Just because one insurer has said that they can’t insure it doesn’t mean that all of them will say this. So if you are told no, even with these examples, it doesn’t mean that is a no for life insurance everywhere.

Let’s take a look at 3 things that you can do to try and get life insurance.

1. Find out why and push back

A lot of the time you will have received a letter that says you are declined life insurance, without much detail about why. We have been working with insurers to try and make these decisions more clear and improvements have been made, but there’s still a way to go.

It’s a good idea to push back. If your decline letter states ‘we cannot offer you life insurance due to your mental health‘, that is not good enough. Challenge the insurer about what it is about your mental health that means they cannot insure you. If you are told ‘we have declined your life insurance due to your stroke‘, this is also not good enough. There must be more detail.

Here are some questions that you can ask:

Why have I been declined life insurance?
What specific things about my health (or other risk) have led to the decline?
Is this that you are declining me for life insurance forever, or is there a time when you can consider my application?

This last question is a really important one as it can be that the insurer is declining your life insurance now, but they might be able to accept the application in 3 months, or maybe it could be 2 years from now. The insurer should be able to tell you this so do keep pushing for answer and if you are hitting a brick wall, come and talk to a specialist adviser like us.

2. Get your medical records

Most of the time when someone has been declined life insurance they have a medical condition and the insurer has gone for a GP report. It is then the details of the GP report that have led to the decline and there are usually a couple of reasons for this.

Within Cura we are used to reading GP reports and unfortunately there are quite a few occasions where the reports are incorrect. This is not a criticism of GPs they are incredibly busy and human error can happen. But, it can mea the difference between you getting life insurance or not.

There are a few examples of errors that we have found on GP reports:

A report that stated someone was drinking 6-8 alcoholic drinks a day, rather than their actual consumption of 6-8 drinks per year.
A report that contained one line that stated someone was diabetic when they had never been diagnosed with this.
A report that was stating the wrong cancer diagnosis.

If your medical records are incorrect it is essential to get them corrected as soon as possible. Not only will this be better for you in general, but also if there is ever a claim on your life insurance it’s best that your records are accurate to remove the risk that insurers will say that you were not truthful in your application.

As well as this there are times that we speak with people and they have forgotten or misunderstood their medical history. This is always a difficult time as it means that you will learn that your health has not been as you believed it was.

Either way getting a copy of your medical records is a good idea. You can get them corrected if they are wrong, or if they are right you can approach the next insurer with the correct information to hand.

3. Challenge the decision

When it comes to a declined life insurance application for a health reason, it’s very hard to challenge this without having a copy of your medical records.

Insurers must follow strict data protection laws and sometimes GPs specifically state that you are not to know what is in the report that they have written, this is rare but it can happen. This can make it very hard to find out what information they have used to assess your application for life insurance.

When your application for life insurance goes to the insurer they will let you know if they want to see a report from your GP and they can only get this with your permission. There are then two choices that you need to make.

See the report – sometimes a little longer as the GP will not send it to the insurer without you approving it, but the positive thing is that you can get a copy and make sure you are happy with what’s in it.
Don’t see the report – can be quicker as the GP can send it back as soon as they have completed it, but you won’t get a copy and can’t check what’s in it.

I personally prefer for people to check the GP report before it goes back to the insurer. If they share it with me I can then check it for all the technical medical terms that the insurers will be looking for and make sure everything is as expected. It also means that if we need to move to a different insurer things will move much faster if we have a copy of the report.

For other risks to do with work, travel and sports these tend to be hard and fast rules within the insurer. They are either ok with what you are doing or they are not. There are times that there can be some wiggle room but you will probably need to have senior underwriter looking at your application. Your best way to get to them is to use a specialist broker like ourselves.

Our award winning advisers are used to helping people that have been declined life insurance, giving this kind of support has been the core of Cura’s focus for over a decade. We will listen to you, help you to understand why your life insurance was declined in the past and find you the best options for life insurance within the UK.

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Kathryn Knowles
July 11, 2023

Categories: Life Insurance

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3 Steps To Take If You Are Declined Life Insurance 2023

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