You’re generally correct. Insurances are a bad investment from a purely financial standpoint. Never get an insurance to save money or to avoid cost. Don’t get insurance for things that you can easily pay for from your savings or for things you can do without. For example, don’t get insurance for your flagship smartphone. Even if you can’t afford the same model again if it breaks, you can always get an entry-level or used phone for a fraction of the price which will do fine for daily tasks until you have saved up enough money.
But there are cases where losing money is just part of the problem. For example, health insurance can literally save your life by paying for a treatment you otherwise couldn’t afford. Or personal liability insurance - if you cause more damage than you can afford to pay for, you can lose your house and pretty much the kind of life you may have lived up to that point. On the other hand, if you’re already broke, living in a shitty apartment and hardly own anything of value, then there’s no point getting that insurance.
UsernameHere@lemmings.world 5 months ago
I realize that there are situations where insurance can be beneficial.
I’m just sharing what I’ve learned from working as a claims adjuster. The company I worked for created incentives for denying claims. Customers were often lied to about what is covered by the person selling the insurance. We often shared technicalities that were found in the contract that allowed us to deny more claims.
This did not only happen at the company I worked for. It is common practice in the insurance industry.
notapantsday@feddit.de 5 months ago
No argument here. I recently talked to someone who works for an insurance company and he said it feels like working for the mafia.
Bongles@lemm.ee 5 months ago
You know I used to process claims at a health insurance company in the US and while the general public consensus is that they hate that company, I’ve never seen the really scummy things people mention online about insurance. There were never incentives to deny claims or find loopholes or whatever. They just had the benefits listed, and various guidelines written out and you were just supposed to accurately process it to those guidelines, deny or pay, whatever.
I’m sure it happens, and there endless other issues, but it makes me wonder what company would risk that stuff if the one I was at didn’t.
UsernameHere@lemmings.world 5 months ago
Insurance contracts are written/worded in a way that allow denial of most claims without much effort. But hard to understand so it is unnoticed by the customer and only the claims adjuster that has read the contract a thousand times would notice.