Q: How do we go about receiving our beneficiary benefits if an insurance company deemed the policy abandoned but it wasn't?
The insurance company asked for paperwork about the deceased primary care physician and hospital stays at time of death, which was provided multiple times. They insisted the facility had no records of deceased, however when we placed the call to the facility, that was clearly not the case and they too faxed over paperwork. A year later we still haven't received a payout and were notified of his estate being abandoned.
A:
It sounds like the life insurance company might have given up (a bit prematurely perhaps) and decided to go ahead and escheat the life insurance proceeds to the state. Go to this website for the New York unclaimed funds department and look for the name of the life insurance beneficiary: https://www.osc.state.ny.us/unclaimed-funds
When you find it, you make a claim with them (the New York Comptroller).
If the life insurance policy had no named beneficiary, then the beneficiary is the estate of the decedent. That means that most likely you will need a probate attorney to help you collect.
Anthony M. Avery agrees with this answer
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