I'm not talking about the life loan issue here.
The life insurance/assurance policy thing on Liveline also related to combined insurance/assurance and savings/investment policies that were sold.
Many (especially working class) couples bought these in the 70s/80s and paid in for years.
My own parents included. I'm sure that many of us remember the "insurance man" calling to collect premiums every week/month?
In some (many?) they were led to believe that they stood to receive a lump sum at maturity.
In many (most?) cases this lump sum was negligible or never materialised.
I have a strong suspicion that there was a significant element of hard sell and maybe mis-selling here - especially to people ill versed in the intricacies of financial products in an era of much less customer protection/awareness than now. But it's probably difficult to ascertain that for certain at this remove?
Yes, WE all know that insurance/assurance premiums are "gone" once spent but these products (deliberately?) obfuscated matters.
Notwithstanding the shock horror coverage typical of Liveline I think it's unfair to dismiss all of the people complaining about this issue/these products as hard necked chancers as some people seem to be doing here.
I think we're at cross purposes here.
Life Loans
The two life loans from last week, there was no issue with those, they were not mis sold etc. But the callers were more than likely upset about their inheritences.
Life insurance tied to mortage or Term insurance
Joe Duffy got confused on this yesterday when he was dealing with the more complicated 'investment life insurance policies. This 'term insurance' is required as a condition of a home mortgage. It's to pay off the mortage should you die. It is not a savings product generally (though it can be), the amount it will pay out decreases in line with your mortgage. When your mortgage is paid off you stop paying the insurance and that is the end of the matter. An insurance similar to car or house insurance.
Life insurance as a savings product, could be for education or a nest egg.
I didn't hear the show but my husband did, he as it happens had the hard sell back in the day with Irish Life. He knew the sales guy and over time he 'persuaded' my husband to buy into one. Late eighties, and I came along and 'persuaded' my husband that it was a waste of time and to get out of it. They were were very complicated, he got back less than he had put in, but he 'invested' the proceeds in our first home. The problem with them is that they are essentially a hard sell con job for the unwary as you've pointed out. The initial premium sounds reasonable enough. And you get lovely brochures with 'projections' but no 'guarantees'.
The low premium, the glossy brochure, the projected great returns, are the lure.
The salesman's incentive is generally a full years premium, hence the hard sell.
And if that wasn't enough, the life companies could come back to you later and say you've now to increase your premiums to get the origional return projected and generally this increase in preumium was not just from say 50 to 60 Euro, but 50 to 200.
Hard necked chancers
This I thought only referred to people coming on the radio and saying they were mis sold products when quite clearly they weren't.
Speaking of the eigthties, or early ninties, the other great scam was a type of mortgage, that was supposed to pay you a lump sum when you were at the end of the term. They were a dud. But all the banks were pushing. Known as Endowment mortgages, my BIL had one of those but luckily pulled out three years in.
