A few years ago I bought an Insurance policy from ICICI Prudential and have recently surrendered it after a very disappointing experience. Here is a review of how I have found the services of ICICI prudential and what eventually led me to surrender the policy premature.
When I was hunting to take a policy a few years ago, I contacted the ICICI Prudential customer care myself and showed interest in buying a policy from them. Their customer care rep fixed an appointment with one of their agents who visited my house a couple of days later. The agent then showed me a few policies out of which I really liked one that promised the highest NAV and a certain assured amount. Overall, the policy sounded lucrative and I decided to go for it at an annual premium of Rs. 50,000. Total period of policy was 10 years with a minimum lock in period of 3 years. If I surrendered the policy after three years, assured sum was 80% of the policy value on surrender date, 90% on surrender after 4 years and 100% on surrender after 5 years. I signed up the papers, paid first premium and so it happened that immediately after doing so, I went out on a road trip with few of my friends. I came back a couple of weeks later and took a look at the policy documents that were delivered in the mail at my doorstep. To my shock, the policy I was assigned wasn’t at all what I had decided to buy. It was an entirely different policy where the funds were tied to the market with lots of ifs and buts. I called the prudential customer care immediately and to my further shock, I was told that I had signed up for this very policy and now cannot surrender or cancel it since the 15 days cancellation period was over. I went to the nearby office, filed a formal complaint and days later was informed that the policy they gave me was the one that I signed for. If I decided to cancel it, I would lose the entire 50k that I paid. Upon inquiring a bit further into the matter, I learned that their agents earned more incentive for selling the policy that I was given. So either the agent tricked me into signing the incorrect documents or faked my signature but sold me a policy that I never wanted.
Since I already had 50k stuck in this policy, I decided to continue with it for the lock in period at least. For 3 years I paid 50k each year and stopped making the payments after the lock in period was over. The money never really grew, it was rather always under 1.5 lacs that I paid in premium but I wanted to wait for 5 years and then surrender it so that I can at least get 100% of the total value. But my nightmare was yet to get over.
Just days before I was about to surrender this policy, I received a call from Prudential customer care stating that I had an option available to convert my existing policy to a better one. Since my money wasn’t really growing, I decided to look at what they were offering. Once again an appointment was fixed and another agent showed up at my door step. He showed me a few policies that I could convert my existing policy to and lured me into choosing one that sounded better and promising. The only condition was that the new policy had a lock in period of 4 years. I had already made three premium payments on my existing policy so I was asked to make 1 more payment. So once again I filled up the paperwork to migrate my existing policy and handed it over to the agent along with a check for 50k towards premium, payable to ICICI prudential. Few days later, to my surprise again, I again received paperwork of a new policy from ICICI prudential with what looked like my signature on it. I immediately visited the nearby office and after a lot of discussions, It was revealed that the agent who came to my house forged my signature, sold me a new policy and attached the 50k check as first premium payment. The entire story about converting the policy was fraud. They sold me an entirely new policy with another lock in period of three years. Luckily, I was still within the cancellation period and immediately cancelled the new policy. The 50k I paid was refunded a few days later. I filed a formal fraud complaint at their office against the agent who forged my signature. I called and visited them a couple of times later to enquire if an action on my complaint was taken but always received vague answers post which I just gave up on the whole thing.
After the 5 years period on my first policy was over, I surrendered it guess what, I did not even get my 1.5 lacs that I paid as premium back. The money shrunk rather than growing.
If you googled, you will find that I am not the only one who has been cheated / tricked by ICICI Bank. They are still a major player in India in finance and banking sector, are definitely responsible for the popularity of private banks in the country but it seems their own popularity is going downhill by each passing day. Rather than satisfying and earning customers, they have largely started into tricking people to become their customers. I have had a bad experience every time I dealt with these guys. It was quite a learning for me as well in terms of checking the policy documents on time, go through the paperwork more carefully and to not rely on agents at all. However after all is said and done, my suggestion would be that you do not keep any dealings with ICICI at all. Chose a better finance company to invest your money.
