Insurance companies and inquests

[tatt]

Posted under money but would also like legal advice is anyone can give it.

Some months ago one of my relatives died on the operating table during a minor procedure he'd undergone before with no problems. There is an ongoing hospital inquiry and the inquest has been adjourned as further investigation was necessary after the post mortem. His widow is struggling to cope emotionally and this is not helped by the insurance company refusing to pay off the mortgage before the inquest. Although his death may have been due to an underlying health problem if it was it is not one that he knew about when taking out the insurance. He had regular medicals and no known health issues when he took out the mortgage although some developed later.

Does anyone have experience of this - I am thinking of a complaint to the regulatory body.

Before you can put a complaint into the FSO, you need to have gone through the full complaints process with the company concerned - so call them and ask to speak to a manager who can tell you in detail why they cannot pay until the inquest, and then ask them to set this out in writing to you.

It may well be that they have a policy wording that states that in the case of unexpected death they do not pay until the inquest (to allow for the cases where the verdict would be murder by a beneficiary or suicide), but you could argue in this case that obviously neither of these could apply so at least an interim payment could be made.
It would be best to not go in all guns blazing, but more in a manner that is focussed on his widow being in financial difficulty, and trying to find a way to ease her problems.

You could get some detailed advice on the MoneySavingExpert forum - there are a lot of insurance specialists there who are very helpful