Life Insurance can be the lifeline for many families in difficult times. These are difficult times in which an Insurance can, at least, alleviate the economic uncertainty of the family. But how do you know if a family member is insured? If the deceased did not record the policy, the answer must be found in the Life Insurance Registry .
Not all families know the Insurance of their members. Sometimes, the hiring of this type of policy is done discreetly, even without the knowledge of the beneficiaries. It is not pleasant to talk about what is going to happen after the death of a family member and a decision as personal as taking out Life Insurance may be made without counting on anyone.
In fact, many Life Insurances remain uncollected because no one claims them. It is estimated that 1 out of 10 policies are not collected because insurers do not have the legal obligation to notify relatives of the existence of Life Insurance in the name of the deceased. In this way, the beneficiaries lost the compensation that would have corresponded to them.
Before, the only way to know if a person had Life Insurance was if the family member or beneficiary had been informed in advance and claimed compensation. But, what if a person dies and his relatives do not know if he had any insurance with death coverage? Today there is a Life Insurance Registry where potential beneficiaries can ask about the Life Insurance of a family member or close friend.
What is the Life Insurance Registry
The Registry of Insurance Contracts with Death Coverage , also known as the Life Insurance Registry, is a body dependent on the Ministry of Justice in which the data related to these policies are registered up to 5 years after the policyholder’s death.
Thanks to this registry, anyone can find out if a family member or even himself is the holder of an Insurance that he did not know. To consult Life Insurance, you have two types of documents, depending on whether you want to request information on your own policies or those of others:
Informative note on Life Insurance
This is a document that can be requested by any living person to find out if the Death Insurance contract policies in their name are included in the Registry of Death Coverage Insurance Contracts.
The right to consult Life Insurance can be exercised at any time, after proof of identity and free of charge.
If the data that the Registry has is not correct, the insured will be provided with the address of the insurer to request its rectification, since the companies are responsible for the processing of that data.
Death Coverage Insurance Contract Certificate
This is the document that interests us if we want to find out if a deceased relative was insured . The Certificate of Death Coverage Insurance Contracts certifies the current contracts in which the deceased person was listed as insured and with which insurance company.
In the event that the deceased person does not appear as insured in any contract, it will also be expressly stated in the certificate.
The insurance contracts on which a certificate can be obtained are:
- Life insurance with death coverage
- Individual or group accident insurance with death coverage
In this way, anyone who believes that they may be a beneficiary of a Life or Accident Insurance taken out by a family member can go to the Life Insurance Registry and request a certificate to prove it and, where appropriate, find out the details of those policies.
Being a life insurance holder without knowing it
The usefulness of this registry is evident, based on the thousands of inquiries about Life Insurance that it receives each year. It is possible that any of us are Life Insurance holders and are not aware of it. These are policies that may have been contracted at the time of subscribing to other services, such as financial products, tourist travel packages or credit cards.
That is why, if in doubt about the possibility of being the holder of a Life or Accident Insurance, it is advisable to find out by going to this Life Insurance Registry, where we can request a free information note on our policies .
This procedure can be carried out in person, by mail or request an information note about the death insurance contract online , with a digital certificate or through the Cl@ve system.
How to find out if I am a beneficiary of an Insurance: request the certificate of the Death Insurance Contract
If we believe that we may be the beneficiary of a deceased relative’s policy, we can go to the Life Insurance Registry and request a certificate of the deceased person’s policy . This procedure can be carried out 15 days after the death of the person we assume may be the insured.
The procedure to request the Certificate of Death Coverage Insurance Contracts must be carried out through Form 790 that you can download from the link or request it free of charge at the Territorial Management Offices of the Ministry of Justice.
Once completed, it must be submitted attaching the original or certified photocopy of the Literal Death Certificate issued by the Civil Registry corresponding to the locality in which the person died. You also have to pay the fees, of 3.78 euros.
In a week, the Registry will issue a certificate with the personal data of the deceased, their Life and Accident Insurance, the insurer with which they are contracted and the details of the policy.
The request for the certificate of Life Insurance Contracts can be made online , with a digital certificate or through the Cl@ve system. In this case, the system is faster and it takes 24 or 48 hours to issue the certificate.
Claim insurance compensation from the insurer
After consulting the Life Insurance in the Registry and obtaining the certificate, the relatives have to go to the insurer to, with this information, confirm whether or not they are beneficiaries of these policies.
In the event that, in fact, the deceased had Life Insurance, but the beneficiary was not the relative, the insurer is not obliged to reveal the identity of the person who is entitled to that compensation.
And if a beneficiary is not designated in the policy, the legal heirs will be the ones who collect the compensation from the policy, as we explain in this post .
If an unknown policy finally appears, the beneficiaries will have to gather several documents necessary to collect the Insurance:
- Medical death certificate.
- Death and birth certificate of the insured.
- Data of the Life Insurance and, if possible, the original of the policy.
- Marriage certificate, in case you are a spouse.
- Identification of the beneficiaries.
In this blog we tell you what steps the beneficiaries have to take, such as obtaining a medical report to collect life insurance , but it is a process in which it can be of great help to have the advice of an Insurance Broker .
The advisors of a brokerage like ours can also advise you when hiring cheap Life Insurance that will give you peace of mind for the future. It is a way of guaranteeing a family financial support in the event of the death of the insured person, who in many cases is the head of the family and the main breadwinner of the household economy.
But if the family is unaware of that policy, it is likely that the beneficiaries will be left without receiving compensation. For this reason, it is important to know the Life Insurance Registry and know how to request information on your own Insurance and that of deceased relatives.
