The Wisconsin State Journal SOS column

Wisconsin State Journal (Madison, WI)

May 21--Gene Wilson bought a pair of life insurance policies in 1956 and 1958, and dutifully paid his premiums over the next several decades as he went about raising a family and pursuing his first career as a school administrator and his second, part-time career in health care and volunteering.

Then soon after he turned 91 -- an age at which a person usually hopes the details of his life insurance coverage have long been squared away -- Wilson started seeing signs that his insurance company had botched one of his policies. And it sure wasn't providing the kind of customer service that would allow the both of them to figure it out.

Wilson bought the $5,000 and $10,000 policies from Central Life Assurance Co. but hadn't been billed for premiums in several years -- which he assumed was because dividends paid to him from company earnings were covering those costs.

Central Life had long since been merged, renamed and purchased out of existence, and today Wilson's policies are in the hands of Athene Annuity and Life Co., and that's the company that started sending Wilson bills for premiums on the $5,000 policy.

The first two bills, for $23, Wilson promptly paid, only to see the company refund them, without an explanation as to why. He got about four more bills ranging from $23 to $414, but didn't pay those because he wasn't sure if those too would simply be refunded, and because he was trying -- without much luck -- to find someone at Athene who could tell him what exactly he was supposed to pay and why.

"Anytime I've called, I can never get beyond the initial contact," he said. The billing department wouldn't return his calls, he said, and a local number for a local agent was always busy.

By the time Wilson drove in to the Wisconsin State Journal offices from Fort Atkinson with his daughter on April 26, he had a list of seven questions that the company had failed to answer despite Wilson's two months' worth of asking. Among them were why, after all this time, his premiums weren't being covered by dividends from company earnings, and why he hasn't been able to speak with anyone in management.

Wilson is not the only customer to run into customer service hassles with Athene. The company and another company that has purchased some of its policies, Global Atlantic Financial Group, were facing scrutiny from regulators in Texas and New York, according to a March 27 Bloomberg article.

Wilson's problem, though, began looking solvable after SOS began making inquiries, and on April 30, Wilson said a company official told him it was "sending me a complete outline and description of where my policies are at."

He hadn't received that as of Friday, but he did get a letter earlier this month from Global Atlantic vice president of operations Leah Hoppe apologizing for the hassles and notifying him of other changes that should clear up the billing problems with his policies.

The company also waived $110.96 in premiums for 2017 and 2018 and let Wilson know that both policies are now paid up through this year.

Check received

Arden Trine reported May 14 that a refund check from a Green Bay-based medical records company arrived on May 12. The check, for $171.27, represented the difference between the $1.73 bill the couple was supposed to pay and the $173 check his wife accidentally made out and mailed, and which IOD Inc. cashed on Feb. 21.

The Trines had little success trying to get the refund until SOS stepped in.

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