Subscribe Feed (RSS)So today I get an email from Florida with a scan of a payslip from the company who laid me off in mid February.
It seems that because I was paying COBRA (a way to continue your health insurance cover after you lose your job in the USA, but at an extortionate rate), I am due a refund.
Well, the money was sent direct to one of the two bank accounts that I had registered with the company I worked for, however it went to an account that I closed in June. I managed to contact someone at HR by email to update my home address, since I am now in the UK, and also to try and get the money sent to the correct bank account, but it’s not quite that simple as usual.
They sent me a form to fill in and send back, where I can either indicate that I no longer wish to receive money by direct deposit, or I can indicate an account that I want to remove from the list of accounts that they have for me.
Well this would be great, except having closed the account they sent the money to, I don’t have any details with me, all the paperwork is being sent by ship to the UK along with my other effects. I do have everything I need for the account that is still open, but the form doesn’t allow me to specify this one, only the one that I closed. Grrrrhhhh!!!
So I emailed HR back, but of course no response in the last 4 hours….
So frustrating and so complicated. Why is it that you always need information that you don’t have easily available?
A similar thing happened to me last week with my car insurance as well.
In the UK with car insurance you acquire a No Claims Bonus discount on your policy based on the number of years without having made a claim. It’s similar in the USA, however in the UK one insurance company can talk to another and obtain proof of your No Claims Bonus, or you can get a document direct from your own insurance company.
Well trying to get something as simple as this from my previous insurance company in the USA turned out to be less than easy as is typical.
It seems that because of the Non Disclosure laws in the USA, the insurance company cannot provide this information to anyone, including the policy holder themselves. So, I had to spend more hours on the phone trying to talk to an agency that handles the disclosures, but they couldn’t find any information on me. Then I had to call the insurance company back again. Finally, I went to the web site for the agency, and was lucky to find a way to get a report. I wasn’t sure if the report would be adequate, but found out last night that the car insurance company in the UK did actually accept the report that I sent them. If not, it would have meant me starting out with a zero percent discount, and paying twice as much as I needed to for my insurance.
I just wonder why life has to be so difficult….
I am sure I am not alone though. Do you have a story to tell of how life has been less than simple for you? Feel free to leave a comment and let me know.
Tags: bank account, car insurance, cobra, complicated, direct deposit, disclosures, frustrating, information, insurance company, Life, no claims bonus, no claims discount, non disclosure, paperwork, payslip, policy holder
Absolutely rediculous that they make you jump through so many hoops. Red tape is the main snack of the USA. Sorry it is always so difficult. We jumped through similar hoops when we went through the refinance of our home. There is no end to the pieces of paper they want to see from years back. So if you don’t keep excellent files (which I only keep good apparently) you spend wasted hours of searching for something you didn’t even feel was important at the time. It is too bad people’s good word have been reduced to meaningless and EVERYTHING must be proved!! So frustrating.
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It really is frustrating. Now I can understand why an insurance company can’t provide information about you to someone else, but to not be able to give it to ME – that’s just silly. These privacy laws are going way too far if you ask me.
I think more and more our world is turning into a “you can’t get there from here” type of world. We had a tornado in our neighborhood a month ago and it did some damage, but not like the hail storm it brought with it. We have our homeowners insurance with one of the biggest national insurance companies and my wife Carmen, has since spent nearly all her time filing paperwork and living with the frustration of being told it wasn’t enough or it wasn’t right and please do it over. It just so happens Carmen is the daughter of a retired agent of the very same insurance company and even with his help and all of her past experience, the paperwork still isn’t right and the insurance company keeps asking for more. My father-in-law assures me it wasn’t like this ‘back in the day’ and he blames government and the ‘big capital company’ syndrome; where the main effort on the company’s part is to make you forget you have paid premiums for many years and to make it such that you finally give up on you claim or take the small amount they offered you in the first place. After all a company can’t make money paying claims. I’m glad to say, so far, Carmen is wining but only because she is more stubborn than they are. Her sign is Taurus.
I feel your pain Tony, and the only answer is just to keep at it. If you can’t get there from here, sometimes you have to build your own road!
I know Chuck, isn’t it just so frustrating getting caught up in so much red tape, especially when have had damage to your property and need things repaired.
I have another person that I network with who had roof damage last year due to severe storms. It took her many months to get the compensation sorted out so that they could get the place repaired.
In South Florida after Hurricane Wilma, there were thousands and thousands of houses with blue tarps on the roofs even 2 years after, just because of all the red tape and the time it takes to get repairs approved.
I hope Carmen manages to get things sorted out for you soon.
Tony. I share your frustration. My wife and I have gone through similar troubles getting her registered/transferred for college the last few months. Seems like there are so many hoops to jump through these days. I’m all for tight security when it comes to personal documents. But when it is too tight for an authenticated individual. Then there are serious issues with the system. I’m sure there are also potential holes that have yet to be found. In this day and age once you are in the system, the system owns you (chuckle, chuckle). Maybe it’s time for us to become cave dwellers, that live off the grid. Best of luck to ya!