I wrote back in August of 2007 that my father was receiving mail from Physicicians Mutual, the life insurance company; most of the mail had Welcome back! in big letters stamped across it. There’s nothing wrong per se with getting mail from life insurance companies, except that in August of 2007, my father had been dead nearly 2 years. He died in December of 2005.
Well, fast forward to now: my dad is still getting mail from Physicians Mutual. As time has gone on, the slogans have gotten better and better. The latest (and perhaps greatest, pardon the cliché)?
It’s Not Too Late!
Oh yes. I believe it is. If you’ve enough money to toss out, you can get life insurance when you’re direly ill, but when you’re dead? I’m afraid not. Perhaps Joshua was right, though, with his comment on my previous post about this: Physician’s Mutual just wants to be, ahem, prepared in case my dad claws his way out of his coffin and zombie-walks back home. If he does, they’ll be ready to accept him right back into their fold. 
It’ll be the next sector that life insurance companies expand into. “Buy life insurance for your dead loved ones! You never know when they might come back!” They could borrow stock photos from old horror movies.
(And to make it abundantly clear: I’m not at all angry about this. I think it’s hilarious. I suppose I could rant and rave about how insulting it is, etc., but – well, I just think it’s funny.)
Comments 12
Sue them, get something out of it. It’s been going on long enough. Geez.
Posted 18 Apr 2008 at 4:41 pm ¶Funny you should write this, because today I got a letter from some pension group telling me how much my mother, who died in july 2005, would get when she retired.
So, after the first, how dare they bother me about this, I thought maybe I should just let this go and cash out her pension. If they are so messy they don’t know their members are dead after three years, so..
And it’s like you say; if you come back we’ll give you that much money a month to live for!
Posted 18 Apr 2008 at 6:53 pm ¶Tom: What would I sue them for? Lack of organization?
Zhayena: I’d be interested to see what would happen if you tried to cash out her pension. They’d probably sue you for fraud, even though they sent the letter. Silliness!
Posted 19 Apr 2008 at 1:44 pm ¶Josh: Use your fantasy! Sue them for emotional cruelness or something like this. You live in America. I thought you could sue everbody for everything there!
Posted 19 Apr 2008 at 4:49 pm ¶Zeitlos: Indeed, you can sue anyone over anything in America.
Posted 21 Apr 2008 at 5:31 pm ¶Zeitlos has the idea
.
How about harassment?
Posted 22 Apr 2008 at 8:11 pm ¶What’s funny, Tom, is that I probably could sue them for harassment, causing emotional distress, etc. But, in the end, they’re suffering from lack of organization more than anything. I’m sure some department, somewhere in there company, knows that my dad is indeed dead.
Posted 22 Apr 2008 at 8:26 pm ¶Josh; No one is suing anyone in Norway, so I guess I should just go for it
What I’m most disappointed over is the fact that if you are working on insurance, pention etc. you really should have access to people’s security number (is it called that, – in Norway it’s “personnumber”. – Everyone gets one when their born).
Posted 24 Apr 2008 at 4:04 pm ¶http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=eu-6IppcvRo&feature=related
Posted 27 Apr 2008 at 2:17 pm ¶zhayena: It’s called a social security number here in the States; sounds like it works pretty much the same way.
vintner: Great video + song.
Posted 27 Apr 2008 at 2:21 pm ¶I know it has been a while since this initial post. I am sorry that you have been receiving unneeded and, perhaps, unsettling mail in the name of your father. Feel free to contact me at sean (dot) morrison (at) physiciansmutual.com and we can hopefully correct this matter for you if it has not been addressed already.
Regards,
Posted 28 Jul 2008 at 10:57 am ¶Sean
Sean,
Like I said, no worries; I thought it was humorous. I’ll toss you an email, though. Thanks.
Posted 30 Jul 2008 at 6:20 pm ¶Post a Comment