A former senior staff with the
First Bank Plc, Mr. Taiwo Shojobi, has petitioned the Nigerian Insurance
regulatory agency, National Insurance Commission (NAICOM), over the refusal of
NSIA Insurance Limited (formerly ADDIC Insurance) to pay him all premium he
paid to the company for an insurance policy in 2008.
Shojobi stated in the petition that
he paid the sum of N330,000 (Three Hundred Thirty Thousand Naira) to NSIA being
the requested monthly premium over the first year in 2008, but since then, the
insurance firm’s agent who collected the payments on behave of NSIA disappeared
into thin air thereafter and never showed up for further collection of the
premium payments. He further added that in as much as it was the insurance firm
that initiated the contract by sending their agent to his office to canvass for
his support, which he gladly agreed to based on their agent’s promise to come
subsequently for the next batch of 12 months cheque for year 2009, but failed
to come around.
He stressed that all attempts to
trace NSIA’s agent, whom he was dealing with, proved abortive, adding that
between that 2008 and September 2010 when he voluntarily retired from the
services of First Bank Plc, he did not receive any communication whatsoever
from neither the Insurance firm’s agent nor their officer until 2015 when he
demanded for his benefits that he was
informed that their agent, who transacted the business with him on their
behalf, had notified them that he (Shojobi) refused to continue payment of
premium, whereas she had then seized to be an agent or representative of the
Insurance firm.
The ex-banker condemned the NSIA
Insurance Limited for relaying on article 6 surrender of policy, which he
described as a deliberate ploy embodied in the policy to defraud unsuspecting
customers who had taken the insurance policy in utmost good faith.
“It sounds funny for an insurance
firm to keep silent when the firm has problem reaching the customer who had
hitherto paid his premium on regular basis principally because it plans to rely
on the so called article 6 to defraud the customer of his hard earned money”,
said the ex-banker.
Shojobi stressed that the insurance
firm deliberately framed up an argument that their agent, who was dealing with
him on their behalf informed them that he refused to continue with the premium
payment without due recourse to him for confirmation, thereby exposing the firm’s
act of negligence to their clients.
He noted that since he was no
longer in paid employment to enable him continue with the premium payment, he
had made several efforts to get all the premium he had paid with the interest,
profit and reversionary bonuses paid to him, but to no avail.
Shojobi, therefore, implored NAICOM
to wade in by instructing NSIA Insurance Limited to consider and deem the
policy paid up and thereafter pay to him the surrender value accrued thereon in
full.
The petitioner, who said he wasn’t
ruling out taking necessary legal action if he could not get the management of
NSIA Insurance Limited to pay him all his entitlements, urged NAICOM to direct
NSIA to ensure full payment of the profits, all accruable reversionary bonuses
and interest accruable on the policy since 2008 to date.
While
calling on NAICOM to urgently intervene and ensure NSIA’s prompt settlement of
all his requests, Shojobi pleaded with the insurance regulatory agency and all
well-meaning Nigerians to help him to prevail on NSIA insurance Limited to pay
up all his entitlements in order to ensure his confidence in the operations of
insurance business in Nigeria was not further shaken.
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