Your client’s parent has died, leaving behind a bewildering, disorganized mountain of papers. The bereaved family thinks there was a life insurance policy, but it’s nowhere to be found.
What’s a financial advisor to do?
There are many quick and effective methods a financial professional can use to uncover a lost or forgotten life insurance policy or annuity, but if all else fails, the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) offers a free online tool that has uncovered almost half a million policies, resulting in $10 billion in payouts.
NAIC’s tool, the Life Insurance Policy Locator, allows beneficiaries, executors or legal representatives of a deceased person to locate life insurance policies and annuity contracts of their late family members, clients, or friends. Between its 2016 launch and August 2024, the policy locator tool received more than 886,000 requests nationwide and matched 460,952 life insurance policies or annuities. NAIC is governed by the chief insurance regulators of the 50 states, the District of Columbia and five U.S. territories.
Requests made through the policy locator tool are secure and confidential and are transmitted by NAIC to the system’s 250 participating insurance companies, according to NAIC. The companies are responsible for contacting beneficiaries and reporting matches to state insurance. The NAIC itself does not follow up on queries once it posts them to the insurance companies, and so cannot provide updates to those who made the queries.
States also assist in the search for life insurance through unclaimed property offices, which can be found through this directory. Michigan, which offers its own Life Insurance and Annuity Search Service (LIAS), reported on May 2, National Life Insurance Day, that it helped to recover more than $8 million in unpaid life insurance and annuity benefits for state residents in 2024.
“Often, beneficiaries may not know if a policy exists and the benefits go unclaimed,” Anita Fox, director of Michigan’s Department of Insurance and Financial Services, said in a press release.
Guidance for Advisors
Although the NAIC and state services can provide valuable assistance, advisors should be able to help their clients locate missing insurance policies or annuities without having to use them, says Kimberly Foss, CFP, CPWA, a senior wealth advisor with Denver-based Mercer Advisors.
Foss notes that most insurance companies don’t require a paper copy of the insurance policy or annuity to process claims. She offered a checklist of steps that advisors and their clients can take to nail down missing policies:
Look for policy numbers among the deceased’s papers.
Check mail for premium notices, dividend checks or other paperwork.
Check past tax returns for interest income from insurance companies or interest expense paid on policy loans.
Go through checkbooks and online bank accounts to look for payments to life insurance/annuity companies.
Check safe deposit boxes, file cabinets or other storage spaces.
Look up the company online and contact their customer service or claims department.
If the insurance company has a local agent, enlist their assistance.
Contact your state’s unclaimed property office.
As a last resort, use the NAIC Life Insurance Policy Locator.
Foss adds that in all cases, be prepared to present:
The deceased’s full name, Social Security number, date of birth, and similar information.
A certified/notarized copy of the will or trust documents.
A copy of the death certificate.
The identification information of whoever is submitting the query (Social Security number, driver’s license, passport or other.)
Foss stresses that financial advisors should be able to locate a missing insurance policy without resorting to the NAIC tool. “If you’ve tried all these other things and nothing has worked, try this,” she said of the Life Insurance Policy Locator.
Dmitriy Yankelevich, CFP, a financial advisor with Barnum Financial Group in New York City, says his experience demonstrates that advisors should be able to hunt down a missing insurance policy or annuity without resorting to a locator service.
“I’ve helped quite a few clients in the past trying to locate their policy numbers and policy information,” Yankelevich recalls. “At least the company name was known, and then we would … get to someone there on a three-way call and just try to get to the bottom of it. Then they usually can look it up by Social Security, which usually is pretty helpful.”
Don’t Let It Happen to Your Clients
But perhaps the best way a financial advisor can help families with lost insurance policies is by making sure such situations never happen in the first place.
The possibility of a lost life insurance policy isn’t a big concern for Martin Lowenthal, a financial advisor based in Needham, Mass. “The only way this could happen to me is if a new client came in and bought [the policy] before working with me,” says Lowenthal, whose credentials include the ChFC, RICP and CLU. “I have records of everything I have sold, so it is very easy to get information.”
Yankelevich suggests that individuals leave a “family love letter” to guide family members after their death. “It’s like a brochure, a few pages long, and it basically lists all the partner contact information, all the accounts and all these things that they usually put it in a safe,” he says. “In case of passing, it’s basically directions, who to contact, what policies you have, or what accounts you have, all written down in one place.”
Yankelevich notes that he formerly worked for the Equitable insurance company, which printed out such guides for families as colorful brochures, but says the idea can be used by any family.
Encouraging a client to prepare a family love letter has another benefit, Yankelevich said. “It offers a lot of ways for the advisor to be connected to not just this particular client, but the entire family,” he said.
Ed Prince is a writer for Rethinking65. In a four-decade career in journalism, he has served as an editor with many of New Jersey’s leading newspapers, including the Star-Ledger, Asbury Park Press and Home News Tribune. Read more of his articles here.
