Dive insurance companies and accidents

[KeithG]

This thread is mixing life insurance with medical insurance. For life policies, either term or whole life, the actuaries know how to make a profit. There is no reason to deny claims which is bad for future business when your whole business model is to make modest amounts consistently.

But clearly you don't understand medical insurance. They are not interested in paying medical claims in full. In fact they employ a legion of nurses and doctors to review cases for medical necessity and reduce or deny payments to providers. Providers can't effectively sue because they'd get kicked off the insurers list of approved providers if they did. So providers tend to: 1) inflate charges in the first place, 2) eat the denied charges, 3) and/or pass on unreimbursed costs to the uninsured through the charges they are able to collect on.

Agreed. Be very careful not to mix up Life insurance with Health Insurance. They are very very different businesses. Life Insurance is a long term (often as long as you live) business while health insurance is a 1 year deal. Think house mortgage vs a 1 year lease.

Health insurance is more like car insurance than Life insurance. The Life insurance actuaries know you will die. They just argue about when.

Health insurance actuaries argue about "if" you will get sick in the next year (kind of like will you have a car accident in the next year). Maybe you will never ever get sick? (or have a car accident?). maybe you will not be a client next year, so who cares what happens then...

 

[Superlyte27]

It's mortality vs morbitity. Actuaries do the math on both.

 

[dmaziuk]

But clearly you don't understand medical insurance.

He's in UK, of course not.

Not yet anyway.

 

[Kimela]

I know everyone loves to hate insurance companies. Really though they are staffed by people and those people generally are trying to do the right thing. If you are covered they want to pay out. If they don’t pay out it will probably be a load of hassle and then they will have to pay out anyway.

You might point out that their end of year bonus depends on profit. Well, is that profit more influenced by how many huricanes hit Florida or by how many divers get bent? And the actuaries ought to be making good guess on the bent divers and setting premiums as appropriate.

My ex has his law degree and worked for an insurance company. His job was to review contracts to try to figure out how to NOT pay. He was looking for the technicalities - the split hairs - and he was very good at his job. If they started to write dive insurance policies like that and hire people like my ex, we may as well not purchase coverage. If you're certified to go 100 ft and they find out the accident happened at 95 and you sank to 101 you would be denied coverage. That's not a road I'd like to see insurance carriers go down. Just my 2 cents.

 

[Superlyte27]

My ex has his law degree and worked for an insurance company. His job was to review contracts to try to figure out how to NOT pay. He was looking for the technicalities - the split hairs - and he was very good at his job. If they started to write dive insurance policies like that and hire people like my ex, we may as well not purchase coverage. If you're certified to go 100 ft and they find out the accident happened at 95 and you sank to 101 you would be denied coverage. That's not a road I'd like to see insurance carriers go down. Just my 2 cents.

Sounds like your husband worked for a crap company.

There are many companies who can’t wait to pay a claim. It makes us look good. Look at Aflac, Geico, Farm Bureau and several others that come to mind.

 

[flyboy08]

You get what you pay for! Insure with Chubb and sleep peacefully....go with a fourth tier provider and hope never to have a claim! The BBB is the best resource for education one on insurance companies. And if your ever denied coverage for which you strongly feel should have been a covered claim, make sure you tell your carrier you will be filing a claim with the States Insurance Commissioner! Every State has one.

The biggest scam in FEMA! Having to buy flood insurance because your in a flood plain that has never flooded is ridiculous. Especially when FEMA will do whatever it takes to deny a claim!

 

[Kimela]

Sounds like your husband worked for a crap company.

There are many companies who can’t wait to pay a claim. It makes us look good. Look at Aflac, Geico, Farm Bureau and several others that come to mind.

He worked for a reinsurance company - so the losses were much larger than a first tier insurance company might encounter. Trust me, I'm not defending him or their practices - just explaining what he was doing and perhaps why. It always felt dishonest and unkind to me.

 

[Superlyte27]

You get what you pay for! Insure with Chubb and sleep peacefully....go with a fourth tier provider and hope never to have a claim! The BBB is the best resource for education one on insurance companies. And if your ever denied coverage for which you strongly feel should have been a covered claim, make sure you tell your carrier you will be filing a claim with the States Insurance Commissioner! Every State has one.

The biggest scam in FEMA! Having to buy flood insurance because your in a flood plain that has never flooded is ridiculous. Especially when FEMA will do whatever it takes to deny a claim!

Actually, A&M Best is the best place to research insurance companies.

 

[flyboy08]

Actually, A&M Best is the best place to research insurance companies.

No not really. That will give you financial strength and claims paying ability...it won’t tell you the paid to denied ratios....

 

[Superlyte27]

Which companies do you think deny claims? The ones without financial stability to pay claims. It’s no coincidence that A&M Best “A” rated companies have the highest customer satisfaction.

By the way, if you’re not a member of the BBB, that BBB rating means nothing.

I, like most other Floridians, get a better perspective. You see, I don’t care how great their customer service might be if the fact that 4 hurricanes will bankrupt them overnight and they’ll non-renew me in the morning. Kinda leaves a cheap taste in your mouth. LOL.

Yeah, I’d rather be with a company that can weather the storm (pun intended). And A&M Best shows you which ones can.