The first thing I am going to say is DO NOT AGREE to letting these "insurance agents" utilize the "voice signature on file" gimmick on the statement of understanding form if any changes have been made to the original contract. Instead, demand to review the contracts in person, sign the contract by hand & then return it to Universal Mortgage & Financial Services Inc.The purpose of this brief review is to inform my fellow Yelpers that it is essential to familiarize yourself with every aspect of the policies that Universal Mortgage & Financial Services Inc. sells because it is very easy to misunderstand the intricacies found in the fine print.In essence, my mother saw an ad for final expense life insurance on T.V. & called into the call center. The "agent" pitched a plan where a payment of $ 97.00 a month would yield a policy worth $ 9,500.00 payable in full after the effective date of the policy if or when she died. My mother could not believe her good fortune and immediately agreed to those "realistic" terms. Part of that agreeing included opting for the voice signature on file option which meant that she understood all the terms and conditions of the policy, surrendered her financial information so the payments would be electronically debited from her checking account on the 30th of every month, and the policy would take effect on the 1st of the month.A week after that initial conversation the packet containing the policy arrived and my mother filed it away with her other important documents under the impression that everything was copasetic. However, that was not the case.After another week had passed she received a voicemail from Universal Financial Services & was told that the agent who issued the policy had made a mistake & the policy had to be "edited" and her response was warranted for the policy to take effect.When my mother returned the call an agent answered the phone, however, because she was out of the office she would call back. Mysteriously however, she was back in the office in less than five minutes and she was quickly informed that the terms of the policy had been changed due to an "agent's oversight" and were to be slashed almost in half. During that "rushed" conversation it was revealed that the agent who had sold the initial policy had offered us the wrong coverage amounts and subsequently left the company due to a "family emergency" & they had not heard from him since. Hence he was not available for comment or to give an explanation as to how he could have so greatly misrepresented the coverage amount.
After that conversation a copy of the "revised" policy was to be sent out for review & we waited for the documents to arrive.
After receiving the documents a week later it turned out that the "new" policy was dated Nov 5 & that the voice signature had already been applied to these new documents. The benefit amount had also been changed to $ 5,000.00 as had several of the other terms regarding how the policy was to be paid out.
After familiarizing herself with the new contract my mother could not understand how the voice signature could be on file (for this document) because it had not yet been reviewed considering that major revisions had been made to the original document and this caused her major stress.
In my honest opinion the practice of garnering voice signatures on file is a perfectly legitimate business practice here in Pennsylvania, however, when major revisions and additions have been made to an existing contract that has yet to be reviewed on paper it is my assumption that a previous agreed to voice signature on file cannot be used to support the new document. Especially when the company in question is dealing w/ an elderly person who could have been made to think that they are signing a great end of life policy (case in point) and then switch that paperwork with paperwork of a different life insurance policy.
When my mother called to cancel the policy because of these suspect business practices before the contract was to take effect she miraculously had the "vice president" on the line who fought tooth & nail to keep her as a soon to be a paying customer. The point that this so called V.P. continuously ignored was that the reason the policy was being canceled was because of the suspect way that "his" underlings had misguidedly conducted the voice signature on file aspect of the contract revisions.
With that being said & after having wasted 15 minutes of my mothers and my time listening to this guy babble on he finally realized that she was in fact dead set on canceling so he transferred us to the agent who issued the revised policy just so my mother could have the same conversation all over again. She told the agent she wanted to cancel & the agent tried everything from her training manual it seemed to not let that happen. She even went so far as to suggest "tabling" the discussion until the following day so that my mother might reconsider. read more
