I’ve never had to take out a policy other than the kind you get at work, so I really don’t know how it works.
I realize you have to have an insurable interest in someone to take out a policy on them. Like a father/child or husband/wife, or business partners or creditor/debtor
But here’s my two questions.
First of all does the party being insured have to know about it. Supposing a wife wants to take out a policy on her husband and her husband doesn’t want her to
As Betty Rubble said “I tried to get Barney to take out a life insurance policy, but he said ‘I’m not setting it up for some second husband of yours to paint the town, especially when I bought the paint’.”
So the first question is could someone take out a policy without that person knowing about it.
Second question is could you cancel it if you knew? Supposing my wife took out a policy and then I felt she was trying to kill me off. I realize that the life insurance company doesn’t pay out if you bump the person off, but perhaps my wife thinks she can get away with it.
I don’t have any real life experience, but I read novels and someone is always trying to bump someone off for the life insurance policy in these books
**So the first question is could someone take out a policy without that person knowing about it.**No. They need to answer the medical questions on the applications and sign the application attesting that they answered truthfully and that they know the questionnaire is to be used to obtain life insurance.
Second question is could you cancel it if you knew? No. Once a policy is issued it can only be cancelled by the owner or the life insurance company. Most folks own their own life insurance policy, but it frequently happens where this is not the case. My ex-wife and I each pay for life insurance on each other, for instance.
In NY, you need consent from the insured, unless it’s your spouse or your kid (roughly speaking). In CA, I don’t think that exception exists.
In CA, you generally need consent from the beneficiary to cancel a policy (you, the insured; the insurer can do it if stipulations are not met).
Re: your hypothetical, none of this applies; in Bedrock, “life insurance” is actually more of a personal responsibility – Barney can’t take out life insurance, and doesn’t have to. Instead, someone will be identified as being responsible for supporting Betty and Bam-Bam. Usually, whoever causes his death will be held responsible; if Barney dies of natural causes, responsibility will be assigned to another party. This responsibility is enforced by others with an interest in the Rubbles’ well-being, such as Betty’s family, her friends, or Bam-Bam when he’s old enough, and usually involves stone tools, or maybe dinosaur bones.
There are mail-order insurance policies that don’t require an exam; if you watch enough daytime TV, you’ll see commercials for them. Generally speaking, such policies tend to be lower in face value than what you can get with an exam.
(snipped for clarity)
Life insurance will pay off even if the insured is murdered. Whether the killer can collect is a different story. Many states have laws that prevent convicted criminals from profiting from their crimes, and that includes collecting on a life insurance policy. I’m also sure that murder for financial gain makes things rougher for the killer. The benefit has to be paid to someone, so it goes to some contingent beneficiary, such as the children, parents or whoever the next of kin is once the killer is out of the picture.