Fidelity Life

I’m busy moving house today, so posting will be later today. Did I mention Fidelity Life are arseholes? No?

Fidelity Life are nasty scum sucking heartless wankers.

Anyway here is some fun for you all.

Len Brown - Troubled by Alien Worms

Today is the 5th Birthday of Whale Oil Beef Hooked

There are 11,681 posts (including this one) and  27,048 comments.

I started the blog because I have always been a TV shouter. The kind of person who shouts at the news wanting interviewers to ask better questions. I also have a deep loathing of most politicians having been around them for almost my entire life. Generally I have a low regard for them for any measure you care to mention, intelligence, integrity, honesty, generosity. Mostly they are liars, rooters, venal and greedy of no use to man or beast.

My blogging is nasty, but it is honest. If you don’t like Whaleoil then tough, I blog for me and me alone.

Blogging has been immensely important to helping me deal with my depression, ultimately it has cost me as it is one of the reasons why Fidelity Life unilaterally disregarded their contract with me. Their rationale was that because I could write 5 posts a day then I could work. Unfortunately for me they chose to ignore their contractual obligations and they chose to cause me 3 additional depressive episodes. These will of course be discussed in court and in the open-ness of this blog. If they think that just because something is before the courts that I will remain silent then I have two words for them that should give them warning “Name Suppression”.

So where to from here? I have no idea. I have plenty of ideas, am having a few discussions but am open to other ideas too. So feel free to comment.

Thank you to all my supporters, fans and loyal readers, and thank you too to all the fuckwits that like to anonymously comment abusing my mental health and weight, it is their vitriol that fires my will to blog. Thanks also to the wankers that send me nasty emails, they say more about you than they do about me and again stoke the fires of my will to out scum.

A kind reader forwarded me the story below about ING and how they tried to work over one of their victims clients before a newspaper got involved to highly. I think the story deserves a wider viewing and I use it to highlight how companies like Fidelity Life work over their victims clients till they have nothing left to give…to the bank, their family, to life.

But to my mind an insurance company’s initial reaction to Pouwels’ claim for her husband’s life insurance remains equally shocking.

ING initially offered only half the expected amount because Frank van Kampen had not told them about a minor bowel condition quite unrelated to his death. Only $158,000 was involved; enough to leave Pouwels owning their one-bedroom cottage outright, or probably renting for life.

To its credit, the insurer backed down – Pouwels’ involving a newspaper in the argument may have affected that – but if I were her I’d find such faceless, calculated insensitivity harder to get over than Downer’s dumb recklessness. Downer was in no state when she killed van Kampen to fully intend anything, while the insurance business is based on coolly balancing odds while fully sober. That’s a reminder, surely, that an anonymous scrawl on a bit of paper can do you as much harm as any drunk behind a wheel.

The don’t use anonymous scrawls to run you down, instead they use supposedly reputable professionals like Anthony Asteraidis, Ralf Schnabel and Prof. Des Gorman to run you down. Together those three along with Fidelity Life do more damage to you than your original episode. The effect is similar to being run down by a Mack truck and the results as devastating. And still they won’t communicate.

The system doesn’t help either. the threshold for going to the Insurance Ombudsman is set pathetically low and costs to pursue them legally absurdly high, they gamble they can win by firstly breaking their contracts, then impoverishing their victims client and then hopefully only having to pay out when they expire, fingers crossed for an omission discovered on the policy.

It is ironic that people take out insurance for that “rainy day” episode and then get washed away in the flood when the insurance company arbitrarily, unilaterally takes away the “cover”.

Someone has been editing my Wikipedia page. Before there are howls of outrage about vanity wiki entries I have to add that I didn’t start the page, haven’t ever edited the page, don’t know any of the people who have edited it and have never asked anyone to do anything on the page for me (I think that covers everything) but I do have a monitor on it.

Yesterday the Fidelity Life saga was added to my page. Their online reputation continues to take a flogging. Whoever their PR company is they are failing dismally.

There is also now a Twitter account called @FidelityLife_NZ.

I have tried for more than 7 months to communicate with Fidelity Life. Their tactics have always been to delay, delay, delay some more, then reject any communication. It is fair to say now, based on the emails pouring in about Fidelity Life that they seem to have an official policy of delaying claims, delaying responding to issues, deliberately ignoring medical evidence and keeping a tame set of doctors and medical professionals like Dr. Anthony Asteraidis, Prof. Des Gorman and Ralf Schnabel in the wings to find in their fvour more often than not. Google those names and you will see that they turn up together in quite a number of cases, and more than a few that have ended up in court. A Google on Ralf Schnabel turns up two rather appalling court cases on the first two links.

Since I started my jihad I have had two un-official approaches to communicate via Fidelity agents. Like all their pseudo-approaches in the past (when they tried to get my doctors and a Occupational Therapist to dob on me) it was ultimately futile.

I had a friend contact Mr. Neil Watling at Fidelity Life as intimated to see the direction that cold be taken. He was shocked in speaking to Mr Watling. Firstly because of the complete diffidence of the man, complete disregard to the situation and then from the downright scurrilous comments he made.

Mr Watling first obfuscated about an offer being on the table. There never has been an offer on the table. Well not in my mind. you see what Fidelity Life thinks is an offer is to ask me to conclude my original claim, completely, forever and never be able to claim for depression ever again. Then to make a new claim for permanent disability. Of course their cunning plan was to submit me to more tests, then to assess my income based on the past year which of course contains seven months on the sickness benefit. If they accepted it then they would pay 75% of my income for the past year, a piddling and insulting sum. They dress this up as making an offer when in fact it is a trap. The medical evidence that I have is that far from my original claim being complete my condition has in fact worsened and it has been worsened by the actions of Fidelity Life.

If it was at all possible to make worse statements Mr. Watling then set about doing exactly that. He told my friend when he was informed of my mental state and the trauma of losing the house and my friends genuine worry that I may go over the edge completely and off myself, that Fidelity Life was confident of their position and any resulting press coverage of my demise.

In other words he said that Fidelity Life couldn’t give a toss whether I lived or died, and that they thought the pr disaster resulting from my death was “manageable”.

I have held this back for a week. I hoped that they might at least communicate like a professional company that takes in millions of dollars in premiums would. I hoped in vain.

I think it is high time that, like finance companies and banks, insurance companies come under the scrutiny of a parliamentary select committee. These companies are taking billions in premiums, and it appears that companies like Fidelity Life have a internal policy not unlike those in a John Grisham novel. They profess to care about their clients in their marketing, in actual fact they care not at all.

I got an email today from a fan.

Hiya,

I’m a regular reader, but never comment. Ordinarily I wouldn’t, but then I saw that prick ‘Chelsea Smith’s’ email.

Anyway I stumbled across something on friday that made my week. I thought you might get a kick out of it so I’ve made one for you. Replace ‘Swedish’ with ‘New Zealand’ and I think that’s a fair description of yourself.

It might take a few minutes to load up, but I promise it’s worth it. Enjoy!
http://en.tackfilm.se/?id=1275218109968RA43

Keep up the good work taking it to those bastard insurers. I’ve just been sorting out some medical insurance for myself, and Fidelity Life is right the hell off the list.

Shot brother!

Hope you enjoy the link.

Not even a week. The Google search results for Fidelity Life are getting embarrassing for them. I wonder why they won’t communicate? If the repeaters can find my details then surely an insurance flunky can. Haven’t even had a call from my agent, you know the one who gets commissions from MY policies.

Fidelity Life Sucks

This post is to demonstrate just how cosy the arrangements are between insurance companies and their chosen professionals that they use to root you over. In particular the relationship between Ralf Schnabel and Fidelity Life.

One of the so-called profesionals that was used to provide “evidence” of my complete recovery from depression was Ralf Schnabel.

In the past 6 years he has met me precisely once and then for 3 hours. Not the full three hours ind, just the first 40 minutes and the last 30 minutes, the rest of the time was spent filling out a complex set of questions to ascertain whether or not my cognitive functions were impaired. Not surprisingly they aren’t, though his tests do conclusively show I suffer depression (amongst other things) and not only that, the depression is above average. Fidelity Life used this test as the basis of saying that because my cognitive functions are un-impaired and that I have had a head injury then I can work full time. Of course the fact that Schnabel broke all the rules in the book in publishing the showing the graphs, scores and results completely out of context is beside the point.

It isn’t surprising then to note that Mr Ralf Schnabel has a nice cosy relationship with Fidelity Life. So cosy that he gets invited to speak at the quarterly meeting of the Auckland Branch of Life And Disability Underwriting & Claims Assessors Association.

The cosy arrangements of Fidelity Life and their professionals

Note that the chair and one of the committee members are from Fidelity Life. Cindy Morby and Mark Brown. I’m sure they are nice folk, but the company they work for isn’t. I wonder if Ralf shared just exactly how good his role is for the industry is getting rid of pesky, annoying claimants, who won’t get well on the insurance company’s time-frame?

LADUCA’s newsletter also makes for interesting reading. Especially the article on how to ensure you drag the chain on claims as long as possible and put your client through the wringer. Oh sure it isn’t written that way but that is exactly the advice that is being given.

I really do think a select committee should be looking closely at insurance companies, especially if National is thinking that opening up ACC to competition might solve issues.

Since this hit the news I have also been alerted to several cases that Ralf Schnabel is involved in with Fidelity Life. I am talking with those affected, one of whom has a complaint against him before the psychologists board. I will post more details of these cases when the claimants give me permission. Fidelity Life told me that they only rarely use Schnabel (3-4 times per year), yet in the space of one afternoon have found at least three people shafted by this guy and Fidelity Life. I bet if I shake the tree a bit harder I can find some more.

Oh and a Google Search for Fidelity Life is really interesting now.

Some people are nice, others send you emails like this:

from: chelsea smith <chelseasmith93@live.com>
to: tipoff@whaleoil.co.nz
date” Sun, May 30, 2010 at 6:23 PM
subject: tip…

Hope this helps…

I have uncovered a guy who’s been pretending to be a productive member of society, preaching etc, outing others, but in truth he’s been leaching, first off my insurance premiums, now off my taxes… He’s claiming he’s depressed. I’m sure he is.  Being found out as a fake would make me sad as fuck. You’re wife seems nice. And I’m guessing her plea for help so you don’t go to jail is her only hope. May be you can practice what you preach and just man up now. Get a job. Stop interfering in other peoples lives and shut up. You never know. It may cheer you up.

Chelsea

Thanks Chelsea (doubt that is your real name) thanks for showing the same amount of understanding of the issues surrounding depression as Fidelity Life.

Google is amazing. Type in “Insurance Companies are” and Google fills in the rest. How does it know?

I wonder how long before Fidelity Life are….completes with crooks?

Google knows Fidelity Life are crooks

Fidelity Life has a brand, they say they are the New Zealand Insurance company, yet when you ring them almost exclusively you get a South African accent. Even their tame psychiatrist Anthony Asteraidis is a South African.

That isn’t so bad. When you check their website to find out just how wonderful they are you get nonsense like this:

Our values

Being part of Fidelity Life means you are part of an extended family of New Zealanders.  We have a wide network of talented people who are dedicated to making Fidelity Life a friendly, progressive and trustworthy insurance and investment company.We strive for both excellence and integrity, and see all our staff, suppliers, policyholders and advisers as PART OF OUR BUSINESS – PART OF OUR FAMILY.

Our values are:

• Listening & Responding
  We engage in dialogue to create value through our relationships.
• 100% NZ Owned
  We retain our original focus to “keep faith” and care in times of need.
• Stewardship
  We make wise and prudent use of resources entrusted to us for safekeeping.

Let me tell you line by line exactly what that crap all means.

For the privilege of paying your premiums you would expect them to mean what they say. That is true while you are paying your premiums and not making claims. The agent even pretends to be your best mate as he swans off to South Africa on a Fidelity Life funded holiday. When the crap really hits the fan though what you get is treated like the unwanted idiot son of your cousin, the guy who shits himself in public and plays with poo. You know, everyone has a relative like that. That is what Fidelity Life means when they say you are part of the family.

They aren’t lying, what they mean is that you are part of the family that they would really rather not have to talk about.

Let’s talk about “a friendly, progressive and trustworthy insurance and investment company” shall we. Fidelity Life has put 5 case managers on me. Some couldn’t have cared a fig for me, my welfare or anything else. Just so long as I sent my forms in they cared enough to check to make sure that if I had forgotten they could stop a payment. One case manager in particular was assigned to me to get rid of me as a client. She told me that. She told me to my face that I was a difficult customer and that she was going to sort me out. She even told me after the first time they cut me off with no evidence or reports to justify their actions that this was to “tune me up”. She said it at Fidelity Life‘s HQ in Grafton. She is also  the one who told me that I should really just go and book in a series of ECT to get the pain over and done with. I’m serious and I’m not making this up. That is exactly what she told me to do. I remember that day like it was yesterday, I even remember Raylean’s name and I remember that she too was a South African. This is the caring , trustworthy insurance company called Fidelity Life.

Trustworthy is an interesting claim to make, particularly when you send Private Investigators after you. They were dumb private investigators though because I caught them. It isn’t really trustworthy either to send letters to you booking appointments with Fidelity’s tame doctors to highlight in bold that if you fail to make the appointment then your payments WILL cease. Yep, just like that, bold and underlined. No matter that they plan to cease your payments anyway once they conclude with their doctors.

You see this trustworthy, friendly insurance company called Fidelity Life sent me along to their doctors. What they didn’t say was that they had specifically asked those doctors to find out specific things. Only one doctor had the honesty to tell me before the meeting what the purpose of the meeting was. One thing they wanted to know was whether I was taking illegal drugs. Another was if I was malingering. The answer that all of those providers to Fidelity Life was emphatically no.

The trustworthy Prof. Gorman, sent me to see a psychologist to conduct some test to see if I had an underlying head injury. Just in case there is something untreated, don’t worry, mate, it is just some routine tests. Not surprisingly both Prof. Gorman and Ralf Schnabel found that no I didn’t have a head injury, that yes I did suffer from above average depression amongst other things like hypo-mania, and hyper-vigilance. They used these reports to say that I was fit for work because my cognitive functions were high.

I had made a claim for and been accepted for depression, and not although I still suffered depression, and indeed, one eminent doctor has said that the ongoing actions of Fidelity Life have cause me to under go three additional severe depressive episodes, but because I have high cognitive functions and no brain or head injury I was now unilaterally fit for work and the payments were suspended forthwith. Oh and for a nice see you later present they offered me $50,000 just so long as I signed a piece of paper that meant that I could never, ever claim for depression again for the rest of my cover of 25 years. They were ending the claim unilaterally without discussion, transition or anything else, and ending any further claims for the next 25 years and trying to get away with that for $50,000. Nice trustworthy Fidelity Life.

Think of it this way. If I had cancer and made a claim and Fidelity Life accepted it, then subsequently sent me for test to see if I had three testicles and then came back and said “Great news, you don’t have three testicles, you can return to work”. I would still have cancer and still unable to work, but not in the warped world of Fidelity Life.

So you see dear readers, you mustn’t really believe what insurance companies write on their websites. They like to obscure the reality of how things work. They would like to obscure that people will lose their houses, be impoverished, place their marriages in jeopardy, all because they have no integrity, do not honour contracts and cast you aside without a care int he world despite their flowery words.

I think I might start a campaign for an inquiry into the life insurance industry, the claims that they make in publications, and their deliver of service. I mean it would be a good idea if National are to consider opening up ACC to competition to conduct such an inquiry to ascertain whether or not private companies like Fidelity Life can be trusted with aspects of the ACC account. Perhaps a select Committee inquiry? Yes I think that is a fine idea.