632.63 Unclaimed life insurance and annuities.

526 words·~2 min read·/wi/chapter-632/632-63-2

A research copy — for the controlling text, always check the official state or federal source. Not legal advice.

(1)Definitions. In this section:

(a)“Contract” means an annuity contract. “Contract” shall not include an annuity used to fund an employment-based retirement plan or program where the insurer does not perform the record-keeping services or the insurer is not committed by terms of the annuity contract to pay death benefits to the beneficiaries of specific plan participants.

(b)“Death master file” means the federal social security administration’s death master file or any other database or service that is at least as comprehensive as the federal social security administration’s death master file for determining that a person has reportedly died.

(c)“Death master file match” means a search of the death master file that results in a match of a person’s name and social security number or the name and date of birth.

(d)“Knowledge of death” means one of the following:

1. Receipt of an original or valid copy of a certified death certificate.

2. A death master file match validated by the insurer in accordance with sub.

(a)1. a.

(e)“Person” means an insured, contract owner, or retained asset account holder.

(f)“Policy” means any policy or certificate of life insurance that provides a death benefit. “Policy” does not include any of the following:

1. A policy or certificate of life insurance that provides a death benefit under an employee benefit plan subject to the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 or under any federal employee benefit program.

2. A policy or certificate of life insurance that is used to fund a preneed funeral contract or prearrangement.

3. A policy or certificate of credit life or accidental death insurance.

4. A policy issued to a group master policyholder for which the insurer does not provide record-keeping services.

(g)“Record-keeping services” means those circumstances under which the insurer has agreed with a group policy or contract customer to be responsible for obtaining, maintaining, and administering in its own or its agents’ systems information about each individual insured under an insured’s group insurance contract, or a line of coverage thereunder, at least the following information:

1. Social security number or name and date of birth.

2. Beneficiary designation information.

3. Coverage eligibility.

4. Benefit amount.

5. Premium payment status.

(h)“Retained asset account” means any mechanism whereby the settlement of proceeds payable under a policy or contract is accomplished by the insurer or an entity acting on behalf of the insurer depositing the proceeds into an account with check or draft writing privileges, where those proceeds are retained by the insurer or its agent, pursuant to a supplementary contract not involving annuity benefits other than death benefits.

(2)Insurer conduct.

(a)An insurer shall perform a comparison of its insureds’ in-force policies, contracts, and retained asset accounts against a death master file, on at least a semi-annual basis, by using the full death master file once, and thereafter using the death master file update files for future comparisons, to identify potential matches of its insureds. For those potential matches identified as a result of a death master file match, the insurer shall do all of the following: