Think carefully before choosing plans. Review on Max Life Insurance

I have been a customer of this company called Max New York Life Insurance since November 2006. I am paying monthly premium of 1250 rupees from November 2006 that is 15000 rupees per year and the total premium paid by me till date is around 50000 rupees. When I inquired the customer support the other day about my fund value they said it is 42k. I inquired them as to why the money is so less and they told me that this is because for the first year they have allocation charges of 25%, second year 20% and from third year onward 5%, so you have to wait for your money to grow.

When I asked her how if I stop the plan as my locking period has been over, she replied blatantly that if you do that charges will continue to get deducted from your fund value as they are providing me life cover (which is not in millions or in crores it is just 1, 15, 000) and in a way after the policy gets matured I will get very less money if I do not die but if I die I will get 1, 15, 000 as death benefit, like suppose if I stop the plan now 5% of my money will be getting deducted every month from 42k and at the end of the day how much I will get after ten years a lollipop in my hand.

So the safe side was to continue investing still the policy gets matured. So on further questioning about where my funds have been invested I came to know that 70% of it is in growth fund i.e. equity market and 30% is in conservative fund (traditional). The operator also told me that having 70% in growth and 30% in conservative is also responsible for money not increasing. I literally could not believe on what she was saying and was never going to, but as I had to increase my money I asked her what needs to be done, she said switching your funds to 100% growth would help your money grow faster, I agreed to that as I had no other option. She told me to go to their nearest branch in the city and fill a switch of funds form and submit it.

The next day I went to their branch. I asked the person there to give me switch of funds form. He asked me to just sign it and the rest will be done by him to which I agreed and said thanks, but few days later I got a letter from Max New York that your request has been rejected and my eyes rolled up when I saw that. I again called the customer care and they told me that you have filled the form wrong I told them saying that it was your person at max new york who filled the form and not me how would I know the technical details of switching of funds. I conveyed to him that I cannot go to your office now and you do it at your end online. He told me that they just cannot do that and I have to go to the branch again and fill the form, I hung the phone immediately in disgust.

A week later taking my time off I went to their branch office again and the person who filled my form surprisingly got transferred to another of their branch far from my home. So, I told another person there that I had my switch of funds got rejected because of the mistake done by the person at your office and you carefully do it this time. Unfortunately their server was not operating at that time, so the person there told me to fill form, I did it by his guidance, but boy this time too I got a letter that my request has been rejected now tell me how disgusted one will get after this.

I immediately went to their office the next day and I came to know that the branch has been closed and all employees there have been shifted to their main branch. I immediately went to their head office and surprisingly found one guy who used to live in my area when I was a child working there. He immediately recognized me and I told him my problem and he sorted the thing out calling the customer care and I took a sigh of relief after this.

At that moment I felt I have done a huge mistake by investing money in this company. If rather I had kept the money in my savings bank account it would have been at least 2k to 4k more than what I have invested in this policy. But as I have done an error to revert back from the policy would be a big mistake so I am continuing to pay premiums till date with the hope that at least I will get good money after ten years because I do not have any other option. So I would recommend think carefully and have thorough knowledge about investing in any plans particularly Unit Linked Plans they sound so attractive but yet deceptive.

I would not say it is a fraud company as everyone is sailing in the same boat but if you choose a good plan and know the shortcomings of it you can get your money's worth.