All our earning years we are constantly planning for our retirement or the education of our
child/children, or our individual long-term goals. The sole motive of availing a financial
cushion in case of your loss gets missed if things don’t fall in place at the end of the day.
What happens in such instances of life insurance policyholders is that your nominee falls into
a trap of complete chaos and distrust. Your nominee is expected to receive the death cover
and not just the maturity amount and hence both the policyholder and the nominee need to
take into account certain crucial points.

A nomination can be made for a life insurance policy either when the policy is first applied for
or at a later time. The nominee may be a child, an adult, or a senior citizen. Throughout the
duration of the policy, the nominees are subject to cancellation or modification. A
policyholder may make many nominations at once. The policyholder may substitute a
different candidate if the existing nominee passes away before the policyholder. The
insurance provider will pay the maturity benefits directly to the policyholder if the
policyholder lives longer than the policy’s term.

A thorough nomination will speed up the processing of death claims in life insurance and
make it easier for your loved ones to get the benefits of your insurance policy when they need
it the most. This means that even a little diligence and effort now will help your family sail
through the family loss smoothly. Therefore, whenever you are investing in any life insurance
policy, you must make sure to disclose all details correctly.

Today, in this blog, we wish to educate the nominee and share insightful points a nominee
should consider while filing for a death claim settlement.

First and foremost, being a nominee, you should keep yourself aware and updated about what
policies and products your husband, parents, or spouse, has/have invested in. Life insurance
products could include fixed deposits, provident funds, PPF, etc.

Then you need to make sure that the nomination has been appropriately allocated and
registered with the primary company you are dealing with. You must check if your name is
correctly spelled and if your contact details are updated and if your date of birth and
relationship is correctly mentioned in the policy documents.

If a nominee ignores or prolongs this step now, then he/she is inviting a lot of trouble at a
later stage. Trust me, managing these things early on helps a smooth financial transition and
also avoids last-minute unnecessary complications.

Once the above steps have successfully been considered and addressed, you now need to
document all details in an excel sheet or a cloud folder. Policyholders must create a
comprehensive document specifying all their investment products along with the designated
nominees, and other important details like premium amount, death cover amount, maturity
date, point of contact, etc. Many times, when an individual is single he/she nominates the
parents. After marriage, they nominate their spouses. So making sure which product has
whose nomination is critically important. Policyholders should update the nominations if
required. It could so happen that the parents are not able to survive up to the maturity period
or the spouses get divorced or separated. In such cases, it is extremely important to duly
update the nominees.

What we need to understand is that these policies are primarily purchased in order to deal
with the uncertainties of life. If because of a silly mistake or plain negligence, your death
claim settlement amount goes down the drain, the nominees can never benefit from it.
Besides, emotional turbulence is added instead of being reduced.

All life insurance policy details are purely investigable in case of the policyholder’s demise
within 3 years from the policy’s start. So, please make sure you add the exact authentic
details only. It’s important to make sure that all details associated with your lifestyle, habits,
health issues, etc need are well-documented. Maintaining adequate transparency will save
your nominee quite a few hassles after you pass away.

Whenever filing for death claim forms for any company, you need to mention certain crucial
information such as your banking details, the original policy documents, and your proof of
photo identity. During this process, a nominee is also expected to answer a few questions
related to the previous health history of the policyholder. In case of a death at a hospital in
the interim of an ongoing treatment, questions will be asked about the course of treatment
taken by the deceased policyholder, and the date of commencement of this treatment.

So what are the points that a nominee should consider filing for death claims settlement?
Here’s the complete list of death claim documents for your perusal.

1. The health history of the deceased policyholder as is mentioned in the policy
   documents. The entire file containing the line of treatment attested by the doctor in
   charge of the treatment and death declaration must be carried with you while filling
   out the form.
2. The cause of death and relevant documents to prove the same (If the death is due to a
   particular illness you need to keep the post-mortem report handy and in case of a road
   accident, you will need a valid police FIR and post-mortem report. In case of natural
   death, you will need the hospital discharge summary document)
3. The original policy documents must be kept handy throughout the process.
4. A letter from your municipality (like TMC or BMC, etc) stating the cause of death
5. Your valid original photo identity proofs
6. Your banking details with a canceled cheque
7. And the death certificate of the policyholder
   
   The most important point to note while filling out the death claim form is the documented
   course of treatment. If you miss this point, the policy company will continue with its
   investigation in its own due time. Most companies settle the claim amount within 10-15 days
   in case of death after 3 years or more. If any documentation is left incomplete, then this
   duration will extend as per the death claims requirement.
   
   One question that arises while completing this process is if you are claiming settlement from
   any other insurance company too. Oftentimes, we tend to decline this question while
   registering for the policy. But at the time of death claim settlement, there is a separate
   column assigned to this question. Here they ask for details such as the name of other
   insurance companies (from where you have taken the claim or are about to file for it) and the
   expected claim amount from each. So, it’s wise for policyholders to mention this detail while
   registering so that the nominee doesn’t have to get into trouble for this.
   If you adhere to all the above points, your journey of settlement for a death claim will
   
   become a cakewalk. In case you are finding it difficult to file everything by yourself, you take
   assistance from your financial advisor. If the nominee predicts potential inconvenience or
   complications, he or she should carefully review the death claim documents and thoroughly
   discuss them with a qualified financial advisor or an insurance provider.
   
   Make sure your financial advisor is knowledgeable and experienced in this matter and if so, believe me, you will not face any complications or complexities in receiving the hard-earned money invested by your loved one (the policyholder) in your interest and for your future.