Named as beneficiary in life insurance policy, not sure with who
Hey folks, fair warning I’ve never posted here and never dealt with life insurance of any sort, so apologies in advance if i get any terminology or understanding of the process wrong. I’m trying to learn as i go. But I recently lost my grandfather and years ago me and my brother were both given paperwork naming us as 50/50 beneficiaries of a relatively small permanent life insurance policy. When we received it which I believe was in 2018, I pretty much just tucked it away with other important papers and documents and forgot about it.
Fast forward to present day and upon examining it, there’s no naming of what insurance company the policy is with. I’m guessing he just printed the details directly from his profile page because you can see the options to add beneficiaries and adjust share percentages and other details. It includes the policy number, my grandfathers info, me and my brothers info including the amount we are both set to receive and individual contract numbers. But it’s missing the most vital information for me to put a claim in regarding his death.
I guess I have two major questions. One, is permanent life insurance exactly what it sounds like? It appears he took the policy out in 2008 but didn’t name us as beneficiaries until 2018 from what I can tell. But it also looks like he was still making payments at the time this paperwork was printed. Is it basically void if he never finished paying off before he passed?
And second, is there any way to effectively figure out what company this policy is with? I’ve called around to a couple and asked them to look up the policy number and my grandfathers info, but so far have had no luck and don’t want to just waste my time, I don’t know if it would even show up if the policy is no longer active. Is the NAIC the only other possible way to basically try and accomplish this besides cold calling life insurance companies? I did go ahead and put in a request with them, but from what I read it can take months to get a response, and you’ll only get one if they find something obviously.
If anybody can help guide me it would be a huge help, I’m in a rough financial spot as is and the sooner I could access the policy would severely improve my situation.
TLDR; Grandfather passed and left paperwork naming me and brother as beneficiaries, didn’t include the company of said policy, what are my options outside of going through the NAIC to figure out if policy is still active and with who?
submitted by /u/frontlinekidd
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