By Regan McCarthy
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wfsu/local-wfsu-969653.mp3
Tallahassee, FL – Florida's insurance commissioner says life insurance companies aren't doing enough to find policy beneficiaries after a person dies. Regan McCarthy has more.
Florida Insurance Commissioner Kevin McCarty says he thinks the practice of failing to deliver money owed to deceased policy holders' families is a pervasive one. McCarty says insurance companies use a list of inactive social security numbers to identify deceased clients in order to stop paying out annuities, but don't always make the same effort to find policy beneficiaries.
"There are going to be cases where on the social security death master it'll say James Paul Smith, but on the policy it'll say James P. Smith. Well, it won't take a whole lot of effort to make those match up."
McCarty says he's working with commissioners in other states to create a procedure that will ensure a greater effort is made to deliver payments. He says estimates the insurance industry as a whole owes upwards of one-billion dollars.