Wrong insurance claims impressions 

Any insurance policy you have is meant to put you at peace anywhere and anytime.

Always ensure you comply with the terms and conditions of your insurance policy (contract), so that when an accident or incident occurs, your insurer will not have any reason to deny your claims. 

Remember every insurance claim is addressed by the wordings and interpretation of the wordings in the Policy (Contract) document!

Some of the common mistakes we make as policyholders are:

• We do not bother to get the Policy (Contract) Document from our Insurer. How can you be in a legal relationship and not have a signed copy of the Contract?

Even for Third Party Motor Insurance, there’s a Policy (Contract) Document but most of us have never seen it, besides the Insurance Certificate we receive, very often from Vehicle Licensing Offices, not even insurance companies.

• Having accidents or incidents that lead to claims, even when it may have been due to our errors, should not make us feel like victims or accused persons. Most of the time, we struggle through the discussions with our insurers on claims, trying to create good impressions rather than stating the issues as they were. Insurers have several means of establishing the facts unknown to many of us.

• Your appointed Insurance Broker is not entitled to any part of the claims payment made to you by your Insurer. That money is meant to put you back to the position you were before the accident or incident. Many times, we don’t use it that way because it is either not enough or we might have taken care of the situation with the understanding of our Insurer before the full payment was made. This will usually depend on the amount involved.

• Finally, an Appreciation Letter to the Insurer for prompt payment of our claims may not be out of place but most of us often say “they are doing their job, why appreciate them?” We completely forget what impact that testimonial would have in a competitive market like ours, yet do not understand why other insurers have huge outstanding and unpaid claims.

After all, it is said that “reward for excellent work is more work!” So, we should appreciate those insurers that pay our claims promptly to get them to do more.

As we all know by now, claims payments remain the “moment of truth” in insurance relationships, so let’s put away some of these common mistakes and wrong impressions, and rather make insurance work for us in Nigeria.  

I remain…

Assuredly Yours,