"WILL MANULIFE PAY?"
In 2001 I started over again in the life insurance business when I chose to re-locate from Saskatchewan, where I had begun my career in 1987, to Vancouver Island. Making that move meant I needed to grunt it out all over again, because succeeding in the life insurance business required that I needed a network of friends and associates who were willing to introduce me to their friends and associates. In the first year or two of doing that, one of those introductions lead me to an ambitious young man named, Christopher.
Christopher was about to begin his own dental services practice in Victoria, and he had been advised by an older associate that one of the most important things he must do is to properly insure himself and his practice. The older associate spoke from first-hand experience since he had suffered a permanently disabling back injury in his early 50’s and had been collecting disability insurance income ever since. The timing of my introduction to Christopher could not have been better planned. In the years that followed, Christopher and I developed a solid business and warm personal relationship seeing each other often in social circumstances and meeting at least yearly to discuss and update his insurance in response to the changes in his business and personal life. His practice was flourishing, and he was becoming well known in his professional circles as an expert in business development in his industry.
Christopher had become one of my best insured clients. In that, I mean to say that how we structured his insurance was the most comprehensive with respect to managing the risks and with consideration to what he was prepared to pay. In those years, Christopher was busy, and he relied on me to give him my best advice on what to do; and he took it and acted on it.
On a Monday morning in July of 2014 Christopher called to tell me that he and his wife were on their way to his doctor’s office. He had, had some tests earlier and the results were in and his doctor needed to see him. Christopher was concerned that the news would not be good. A bit later that morning Christopher called back to tell me he had an aggressive form of kidney cancer. He asked if we could meet soon to discuss his insurance. We met two days later at his favourite golf club in the morning at breakfast. There I learned more details of the diagnosis and what was the plan for treatment. We also did what we needed to do with regard to beginning the claims process for his critical illness insurance and prepare for a claim for disability and business overhead insurance, should that be necessary. The last item we discussed was to make sure that the beneficiary designation for his life insurance accurately designated his wife. Although his critical illness insurance was with Empire Life and his disability insurance with Canada Life, we had chosen to place his life insurance with Manulife. The amount of life insurance was sufficient enough so that if the worst thing happened, his wife would not have to worry. As I stood up to leave and to give Christopher a hug good-bye, as had always been our ritual, Christopher quietly asked me........
“Will Manulife pay?”
I understood then the severity of Christopher’s new reality. With no hesitation, I answered.......
“Absolutely, without question, Christopher, and so will Empire and so will Canada.”
About 30 days later I gave Christopher a cheque from Empire Life for just over $100,000.00 in critical illness benefits. In the following months, he continued to run his practice but became increasingly weaker. Then in March of 2015 he had to step away and hire a locum. Canada Life (Great West Life) began to pay Christopher $4,330.00/mth in disability benefits and $18,741.00/mth to his corporation to cover the office overhead.
In the Spring of 2015, Christopher and his wife traveled to Germany to seek alternative treatment that was not available or approved in Canada. They were there for about three months and returned home in June. Christopher passed away on July 22nd. He was five weeks past his 45th birthday.
Manulife paid.
I still get a lump in my throat when I think of Christopher. But I am also proud of the work I did for him and how it contributed to the last year of his life and how his wife was able to carry on after with little financial struggle. And to my point, Empire Life, Canada Life and Manulife all responded precisely the way I promised Christopher they would.
Incidentally, there is nothing here that is not accurate. Everything can be verified and Christopher’s widow has given me permission to share this story.
A bit more personal information if you care to read:
Thanks to a few wise decisions, good luck and some other business interests that went our way, my better half and I are in a financial position that permits us the freedom of not having to work as hard or as much as we had most of our lives up to now. Going forward, I am choosing to stay in the life insurance business in many ways because of the events with Christopher and having watched how seamlessly the insurance companies responded to that event and how well it served him. I recall being told in my first year or two in the business back in Regina, that....
“You’ll never be in the insurance business until the first time you hand someone a cheque”.
My purpose in sharing this story is to offer evidence and bear witness that insurance will do what it promises to do and then to compel others to act as result of reading.