Insurance, not Air-India

Almost anyone who has had the misfortune of recovering a claim from aninsurance company, whether for a car stolen or totalled, house burgled, orthe death of a family member, it is the same familiar story of bureaucraticcussedness and delays, rude behaviour, endless waits and inefficiency, ifnot also commissions and fixing. The entire business, in the best of the PSUmonopoly traditions, works as if the state is doing the consumer a favour byoffering him insurance. The whole thing is a self-serving network of agents,surveyors, bureaucrats and commission agents. This makes recovering aninsurance claim one of the greatest nightmares of our lives. Far too many ofus have learnt our lessons directly. I learnt mine several years ago when myhouse got burgled.

To begin with, I was advised by officials of the insurance companythemselves 8212; to inflate the claim. 8220;You must understand, sir, in ourbusiness, we cannot refund full claims. We have to make sizeable deductionsto satisfy the bosses and the auditor8221;, they said.

8220;But how can I inflate the claim? I can only report to the police what hasbeen stolen8221;, I said.

8220;Don8217;t worry, sir, what about your laptop? Why not put that also in theFIR?8221;, asked the official, pointing at the Toshiba sitting on my desk.8220;But how can I, the computer is right here?8221; I asked.

8220;How does that matter, sir? This will at least cover you for thededuction.8221;

I chose, unwisely, I suppose, not to report what hadn8217;t been stolen. UnlessI be accused of lying to the police or keeping stolen property, but was madeto regret it later when after a full two years, the claim was paid, minusthe 8220;normal8221; deductions which amounted to the value of a laptop and ahalf. The real story, however, is what happened in the interim two years.The most valuable ally of our insurance monopolies is our police system.

Almost no claim can be paid without that magical piece of paper from yourlocal police station certifying that there is no chance of tracing orrecovering your stolen goods or car. Now which self-respecting SHO wouldmake that admission happily? So, unless you know somebody higher-up, thecertificate could take months to come. And what happens even when it comes,as it did in my case, once someone higher-up put in a word?

It was, perhaps, only my misfortune, but it is something that could happento you too. My burglar got caught. There were frantic calls from the policestation as well as the insurance company8217;s office. The claim, I was told,cannot be processed till the police interrogate the man wanted for 300burglaries in Delhi 8212; and give a fresh certificate that nothing could berecovered. So I went back to the police station.

The burglar, I was told, was still in the custody of another police stationand it won8217;t be until some time before my SHO laid his hands on him andasked him questions about what happened to my belongings. In sheerdesperation, my family even drove to the Tughlaq Road police station todirectly chat with the burglar who, it seemed, had a great memory.

8220;Aren8217;t you the people who kept sleeping while I burgled your house? Theonly problem was your landlord, the Sardarji, woke up early and I had toleave in panic8221;, he said. This could be the reason why he didn8217;t steal thelaptop. He remembered the rest of the stuff he had taken. Jewellery, hesaid, he sold in old Delhi8217;s Dariba Kalan. And the camera, he said, droppedfrom his hands into the Ganga while he was taking pictures on a pilgrimageat Rishikesh. But, surprise of surprises, our Sony Stereo was very muchthere along with the remote. Soon enough we reported our findings back tothe insurance company.

8220;What a pity. I really feel sorry for you8221;, said a very sad lookingmanager.

8220;But why?8221; I asked. 8220;The thief has been caught, our stereo found8221;, Isaid, and handed over the letter finally withdrawing the stereo from ourlist of claims.

8220;That is very silly of you,8221; he said. 8220;The worst thing that can happen toa burglary claimant is if a part of his stolen property is found8221;. Ourclaims, he said, had been vitiated. 8220;The one thing we, honest insuranceofficers, always pray for is that no burglar should get caught. It isimpossible to get a claim of this kind past the auditor8221;, he explained.I was, perhaps, particularly unfortunate as, just when I secured a freshletter from my SHO that nothing further could be recovered, the burglar hadescaped. The policeman went after him and produced his ripped shirt asevidence of the chase. And yet, just when the claim was being processed hewas caught again, now in Chennai. More calls from the 8220;higher-ups8221; to thepolice station, more certificates and a few months later, we thought we werefinally getting our money.

But by now our friendly manager had retired, his successor said the earlierfile was untraceable, and could we please help by putting together thedocumentation again? The matter was finally settled with more calls from8220;higher-ups8221; 8212; this time to the insurance company.

So many of us have stories of this kind 8212; of our loss, wastage of time,energy and humiliation in dealing with our insurance monopolies. And if youstill feel reassured once you8217;ve paid your premiums, please read the fineprint on your policy document. The usual Life Insurance policy has so manyexceptions listed that you8217;d probably need to die only of a heart attack foryour family to recover anything at the end of the day. I figured this duringthe Kargil war last year as The Indian Express went around shopping forinsurance policies for its reporters and photographers risking their liveson the battlefront. No insurance company offered a policy that covered youfor war, war-like situations, accidents during war-like situations, nuclearattack and accidents and so on. Since our reporters were rather fit andyoung, not particularly chicken-hearted and thus unlikely to suffer a strokewhen the first Bofors gun boomed, we chose not to buy insurance.

The inadequacy, inefficiency, high costs and red-tapism in our PSU insurancemonopolies have blighted our economy as a whole as viciously as thenationalised banks and the state electricity boards have. The state is nowset for a change from all that. So, when the debate gets shrill, when theLeft and the Swadeshis cry blue murder and when last-minute concessions aresought to protect domestic this and domestic that, please remember the lasttime you dealt with your insurance company and chances are you won8217;t buythat lemon again. Remember also that the real test of the reformers is notAir-India, but our insurance.

All monopolies stink. But state-owned cartels stink most of all.