Dear Sir

I am having this policy since 2003. Policy cannot be renewed once card is closed(on the death of the card holder) However policy is valid up to 31st March of every year once premium paid. As per terms & conditions of the policy, it can be ported to New India Assurance's individual /floater policy directly from any branch of the company. This can be done in advance also(before the death of the policy holder).

With Regards

Satheesh Rao

Hello Anuj,

This is a very valid question.

• Since a group policy is issued to a "member" of the group in this case being the credit card holder, technically the policy cannot be renewed in the case the membership terminates due to the death of the primary member.
• As a remedy, to avoid the cover ceasing, the spouse of the primary member should ideally be given the option to apply for portability and move to a retail insurance policy. However, unfortunately, this too will not be hassle-free for senior citizens - as insurers, as per portability guidelines can evaluate the entire application afresh and, demand medical tests and then decide to approve or decline the porting application.

Having said that, I would still recommend that the customer once raised this question with Citibank. This is a very popular group policy, and such scenarios hence may have occurred several times in the past. We are hoping the bank or the insurer would have made some provisions or a workaround to help customers transit into another card relationship or insurance plan.

Would be great if you could share your experience, after talking to the bank, so that it can benefit many others with a similar problem/question.

Regards,

Team Beshak.