Dear Asav
This is my first comment about your very informative blog, although I was following it for the past 2-3 months.Congratulations to the Formidable work.
I am a NRI Doctor and I have certain queries about Life Insurances.

1. Being NRI am I eligible to buy insurances like i Protect , I term or any other Term policies ?
[With I term there is a box asking about Residence]

2. I have existing policies with LIC[ endowement] and ICICI [ULIP].
which I took when I was a resident. Are these policies valid when I am a NRI.[ I know u are against endowment and ULIPs.. which I will b quitting soon]

3.Are NRIs allowed to open PPF accounts in India

Once again let me congratulate you for the excellent work you are doing..
Abey

Hello Abey,
Well Thank u for asking a question.

Well, Recently I have shifted discussion session on my new forum - Investta.com

I request you to kindly post your this query in Personal Finance section of Investta.com

I will be more than happy to answer your this query in detail.

Anyways...Waiting for you on Investta to answer all of your queries...!!!

Hi Asav,

I can completely correlate with your advise to split your term insurance into 2-3 plans..assuming I want to go in fr a 1Cr cover, do u mean I should tk up 2 separate 50lac covers with iProtect...or tk 50lacs with iProtect and say 50lacs with iterm ?

@ Prasan -->

Hello Prasan,
I request u to ask your this query on my new forum - Investta.com
As I have recently shifted discussion session on my new forum.
I will be more than happy to answer all of your queries over there.
Sorry for this inconvinence caused to you.

I have made an online payment of 43k for a 1 cr iProtect policy

amount is dr to my account through vbv (even this site shows payment gone through) but icici site showed payment not made.

call center can not help

no personal contact person given anywhere in case of problem


anyone know where to contact

I was looking for a term plan and decided to go with ICICI Prulife’s iprotect plan since the premium offer was competitive and could be done online. The nightmare started after paid
premium on 01-Nov-10.
The company promises about a doorstep document pickup. I was not contacted by anyone for about a week and I called up customer care centre. I was adviced to provide Income proof, ID proof etc. They wanted me to email it to buyonline@iciciprulife.com When I tried sending, it all bounced back. I called up CCC again and was adviced to walkin to a branch and submit docs. I did the same at ICICI pruLife Thrissur, collected my medical checkup forms, compl eted medical checkups as prescribed by the company.

I called up CCC was told that I was an “Elite Customer” and to be “rest assured as all documentation has been fulfilled”. I was also told that the underwriting could be completed in 3 to 6 working days and policy shall be issued ASAP.

But, after waiting for one month, I received letter form their underwriting department asking for more documents like Form 16, bank statement PAN card copy etc. If I had known these documents were required, I could have given them on those on the day I walked into their branch in Thrissur.

This time, I walked up to ICICI Pru Life in Edappally, Kochi and submitted all docs and ensured that nothing was pending from my end. This happened on 11-Dec-10.

The worst part of story happens now-

A week later I get a call from some number in Pune. He introduces that he is Anshuman Mishra from ICICI PruLife, cites my application ref: no and requests for submission of Form 16 and ID proof. He started the conversation in Hindi. I requested for communication in English as I had challenges in speaking good Hindi. All he said was “pending document bhejiyega”, “pending document bhejiyega” and banged the phone.
I called up CC and explained what had happened. I was reassured that all documentation has been completed and policy was pending with the underwriting team.

In another 5 days, I got a call from ICICI PruLife again asking me to send my Form 16 and ID proof to buyonline@iciciprulife.com and another personal address on ymail.com. I did not want t do that and enquired with CCC again and got the same answer.

Finally on 30-Dec-10 I come to know through the online tracking system that the policy has been withdrawn and no explanation was provided. I called up CCC and had to hear from that they donot have access to why the policy is withdrawn. She also added that the company may send some “ hard copy letter citing the reason” for withdrawal. Until this time, I have not received any letter.

I found an utter lack of coordination and professionalism in the way they dealt with the application. Looks like their departments just toss documents over the wall and never talk to each other.

I have been following up with the company to know the reason for withdrawal and they keep extending deadlines committed. All this and the delay of 2 months make me to say, pls opt for some term cover other than ICICI Prudentials product. Or else, be prepared to gift your money to ICICI for 2 months and face the shame of the money being tossed back to you; without any apology or explanation.

I believe that there could be a minimum of 1000 similar cases happening at the same time and that gives the opportunity to ICICI to keep an amount equivalent to 1000 annual premium units (roughly INR 80 lakh) under posession without having to pay up any penalty.

LIC or the life insurance Corporation of India is an entirely government owned entity and enjoys the position of being India's largest insurance company apart from being nation's biggest investor. LIC was incorporated in 1956 and has been functioning pretty consistently.