A report aired by ABC TV’s 7.30 this week revealed the stories of two AMP customers who have been waiting years for responses around their total and permanent disablement (TPD) claims.
One customer’s claim was approved by AMP last month after a five-year wait, while another is waiting on an outcome two-and-a-half years after the initial claim.
An AMP spokesperson told ifa that the company is “very sorry for the challenges being faced by these customers”.
“Making a decision that a customer can never work again is significant and very complex and while this does take time, we acknowledge that these two claims have not been assessed in a sufficiently timely manner,” the spokesperson said.
But AMP also added that it strongly rejects any suggestion it is deliberately delaying claims decisions or doctor shopping.
“In the insurance business, our claims team has been focusing on making improvements to claim management, particularly around our response times for decisions,” the spokesperson said.
“Last year alone, we paid around 11,000 customers more than $1 billion in claims – and more than 1,000 of these were TPD customers.
“But we know we have more work to do and we are striving to improve how we help and support our customers during some of their most difficult times.”
Tasmanian Private Wealth Advisers principal Mervin Reed said a large chunk of the life insurance industry is owned by banks who have never really understood the life insurance business.
He said the banks have “done their best to reduce this once proud industry to a limited selection of not very great product”, and are “now held in disdain by the public”.
“If you can’t fix up your claim system and pay claims, notwithstanding your company is bleeding to death on the claims side of the ledger, then you shouldn’t be in the industry,” Mr Mervin said.
“It’s a bit too late when the claims arrive and you don’t have any money. It will be very, very unlikely that the government will bail any life insurer out.”
Earlier this year, AMP announced a 2016 full-year net loss of $344 million within its life insurance division.
Commenting on the result, AMP chief executive Craig Meller pointed to action taken in late 2016 to “reset and stablise our business”.
This is day light robbery, they are deducting almost $700 a month from an 80 year old mans super and month charges continue to increase. God forbid the man passes the family is only eligible for an $80k payout. It is as though they are increasing prices to force you to opt out yet they will happily pocket the past 30 years of monthly payments made.[s[size=20px][/size]ize=20px][/size]
You’d have to have rocks in your head to recommend AMP. They have an army of advisers pushing new inflow so they aren’t going to be afraid to ignore the non AMP adviser or even decline the odd client.The only advisers who should use AMP are AMP advisers. At least use a company that gets revenue from different sources, at least you might might stand a chance of getting claim paid for a client. We’ve reached the point with vertical intergration that it’s not in a clients best interest to use AMP regardless of price.
Anonymous, this cant be coincidental as they did the same with me and my client. I found out after reviewing my client’s super and insurance portfolios that they didn’t notify me of the client’s claim, paid the client and then closed the claim after 1-2 months of the claim being admitted. When I approached them after I found out I was told by the claims person, sorry I didn’t think about contacting you….”apologies”. The problem with these insurance companies is that they must understand that they are product manufacturers and these client’s are our client’s being introduced to them and NOT their clients!!!
Well worst part is I actually submitted the claim for the client and they did this behind my back… I was genuinely bewildered. Its disgusting behavior and a leopard never changes their spots.
Even with this practice they are losing money on the insurance business, imagine if they actually did the right thing.. not to mention they apparently offer advisers upfront commission payments to churn old policies to new definitions… The industry wont move forward until this stuff is addressed.
A lawyer has long been a requirement to make a claim with AMP. Will use every trick in the book to avoid paying.
Not surprising… They also, behind my back, sent a client of mine a ‘sign here to accept 4 weeks of income protection payments and close claim indemnifying AMP’ when client was entitled to 26 weeks… Fortunately, the client asked me first and they got their 26 weeks…