Page 48 - The Insurance Times January 2022

LEGAL

Get policy terms chganged during free tion of policies, without putting any written communica-
tion on record. The commission wondered why Das had not
look-in period
exercised caution in the subsequent polkcy taken by him,
Babulal Das filed a complaint before the Howrah District and had allowed the same 'mistake' to get repeated over
Forum alleging he had applied to Aviva Life Insurance for and over again on six occasions spanning eight months. The
the purchase of two single-premium policies, having a pre- commission concluded tha the onley inference was that
mium of Rs 61,854 each. But the company had wrongly there was no miktake and that the complaint field was
issued him regular traditional policies, which required the devoid of merit. So, it upheld the dismissal of the complaint.
payment of periodic premiums. In his complaint, he stated Das then filed a revision petition. He claimed that the agent
that corrections were not made to the policy even after he
had given a handwritten, but unsigned calculation sheet,
had pointed out the anomaly. Das sought a refund of his
giving a calculation of the refund amount. The insurer dis-
premiums, along with compensation and costs.
puted the authenticity of the calculation sheet. So, the
The insurer contested the case. It stated that Das was an national commission held that it did not have any eviden-
educated person who had applied voluntarily for the poli- tiary value.
cies. It added that Das had neither disputed the policy terms The national commission also observed that Das' occupa-
during the free look-in period of 15 days prescribed by the tion, as mentioned in the proposal form, was different from
Insurance Regulatory and India (Irdai), nor had he made the one mentioned in the complaint. In spite of this, income-
any request for rectification of the policy. The insurer ar- tax returns were not produced to substantiate the correct
gued that Das had no right to seek a refund after the ex- facts. Likewise, even in the revision, Das had failed to pro-
piry of the free look in period, as the insurance contract duce any proof to show that he had opted for single-pre-
had been concluded. mium policies. The national commission concluded that in

The forum observed that there was no documentary evi- the absence of proof, the complaint had been rightly dis-
dence to support Das' case that he had sought single-pre- missed.
mium policies. On the contrary, the documentary evidence The commission also noted that the policies had lapsed
showed that Das had sent the insurer a letter of thanks for during the intervening period. Since the policies were not
the policies issued to him. Later, he had also transferred revived, the amount payable was calculated and remitted
money to the insurer. No explanation was given for why the to Das, who chose not to encase the cheque. The commis-
transfer had been done, which led the forum to conclude sion observed that the cheque was remitted in accordance
that the money was remitted towards payment of insur- with the terms of the policy, and it was not possible to hold
ance premium. So, the forum dismissed the complaint, the company liable, merely because Das had failed to
holding there was no evidence to establish deficiency in encash the cheques.
service. Accordingly, by its order of November 30, delivered by Jus-
Das challenged this order in appeal. The West Bengal State tice R K Agrawal on behalf of the Bench with S M Kantikar,
Commission also refused to believe that an educated per- the national commission agreed that the complaint was
son like Das would only make verbal requests for rectifica- without merit, and dismissed the revision petition.

48 The Insurance Times, January 2022