Transamerica Review

The bad reviews are true. After over 20 years of paying premiums, my father was admitted to a nursing home. He has Parkinsons and dementia, which have been clinically diagnosed.

But TA will still send someone to the nursing home to "observe" the claimant, even though either of these conditions will qualify you.

They finally started reimbursing my parents the contract amount for his nursing care, but you have to constantly call them and request the latest month's payment. Each time you call, you get a recording that puts you on hold forever, sometimes over an hour.

Then, when you finally speak to someone, it's someone you've never spoken to before and you have to tell them the whole story that you told the person the last time you called, and the person before that, etc.

Sometimes they act like they know what they're doing, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they are nice, other times they are rude. My father's policy was for one year of nursing home care, and two years of home care. I must have called Transamerica 100 times.

Do not believe them when they say they will look in to something and call you back. Not once have they called back.

Some pointers: --- READ THE CONTRACT over and over until you understand it. It is very important that you know what you're talking about with them or they can just tell you things that might not be true.

--- TAKE NOTES of every time you talk to them, including their name, the date and time, why you were calling them and what their responses were. I had to refer to my notes constantly and I think it would have been impossible without them.

--- Keep a calendar with each day that you receive service that is reimbursed. They only provide for a certain amount of time, and sometimes they count wrong.

--- If they take longer than a month to pay after they get the claim, make sure they also pay you interest. Sometimes they "forget".

After reading the one (1) Star reviews on the web site, I am questioning myself as to why I asked for information about a long term care policy??? Were these reviewers some of those people that ask for everything and even some impossible things???

I just want my wife or I to be well taken care of and funds available in order that a nursing home will not lay claim against our estate and our daughter be left with nothing and no way to afford us living in long term care. I don’t think this is a bad question, it’s just one that seems very important to answer!!!

We have had LTC policies since 2001 and have paid every month since. My husband now has Alzheimer's and I have been trying to get Transamerica to pay for his day care. FORGET IT! Just like all the other reviews, this has been a nightmare. They will do anything they can not to pay you. I submitted a claim back in January 2020 and provided all the necessary backup paperwork they requested.

After several more submissions of the exact same paperwork, I finally got a letter dated April 6, 2020 saying the claim was approved. NOT! This is almost July and I have been on the phone with their Claims Dept. Since then trying to find out when we will receive payment. First, they said they didn't get everything they needed.

When I finally got someone there to confirm, that 'yes', we have all the documentation, I was still getting letters asking for documentation. The reason was a new issue: they tell me that there are two now (2) claims and that I have to meet the requirements of the second claim. I never submitted a second claim.

When I ask what the second claim number was and who submitted it, I get no answer. Again, a ploy not to pay. When I tried to explain why there is no second claim and ask for a supervisor, they say one will call me back. I'm still waiting. I'm thinking of hiring an attorney who deals in these situations to get me what's due. That's all I'm asking. You wouldn't mind, but I don't even want them to pay the whole invoices I'm getting from the day care facility. I'm perfectly willing to pay half myself, out of pocket. Terrible company. Don't buy their insurance of any kind.

We opened an LTC claim for my father-in-law in January and it has been nothing but awful dealing with Transamerica. Our experience mirrors all the other negative reviews. It is unbelievable that this company can get away with withholding thousands of dollars in payments through bureaucratic delay tactics.

We have spent countless hours on the phone and sent in multiple copies of documents for every single little claim item. If you are in the market for a LTC policy, do not even consider Transamerica.

My husband and I have had the Transamerica LTC policy for years. He recently had to go to a skilled nursing home because I could no longer care for him at home. I am having a nightmare just trying to get a claim started. REALLY! My husband has Parkinson's with dementia. He has hallucinations and is delusional. He has many other health problems as well. He has many falls because of his Parkinson's and his care has simply reached the point that he needs more help than I am able to provide.

This was a plan that was advertised with our local credit union (which we use for all our banking needs). Every time I call for a status update (which I feel they should contact me per phone call if needing more information) I speak to different people and usually 3-5 with every call. So dysfunctional and nothing more than sending me in circles to be told the same thing : which means they do not know either!

I trusted the sale representative and so did my husband when we took this plan. We are both covered and felt this was a wise investment for our possible future needs. WELL, I have one problem after another trying to get the claim started. You do not have a representative to help you with this process. I am on hold for a long time and then have multiple transfers with more hold time.

We are in lock down because of the corona virus still in our state. They would not accept information via email attachments and stated information needed to be mailed or faxed. Well we do not have a fax, so I sent the information to the nursing home and the social worker printed the attachments and faxed them to the company to get the claim started. After they denied receiving the information via fax two times, I mailed the information with a received at address notice from the USPS. They have denied receiving documents every time they have been sent.

Now I am waiting for the "eligibility dept" to review the request and decide if this meets the claims. I was told if they deny I can file an appeal. I requested a supervisor, manager or representative to speak with about this process. I was told that the eligibility department does not take any incoming calls and does not make an outgoing call. I was also told it can take 7-10 days to make determination and then they will MAIL a letter. I was also told that they do not know how long it takes to receive any payment for claims submitted. There is no source of help to maneuver this maze process.

I feel that this is a scam to get people to give up from the frustrations! We have invested lots of money in premium payments over the years, This is a stressful and difficult time for my husband and myself. I will not give up on this claim. My next step will be to figure out how to file a complaint with insurance governing bodies (if there is any for long term care insurance plans). I am making a notebook of calls and frustrations for our children. If I use my plan they will need to know the frustrations encountered. I will keep working at trying to get the payments we are entitled to for my husband. His last premium was paid on the due date; which was also the date he was admitted to the skilled nursing home.

I realize from the other reviews that will be difficult for me to receive a refund of money paid. They bill in advance so the 3 months we paid on the date he was admitted should all be refunded minus the 1 day of that cycle. I plan to contact the bank so they will not allow any more automatic payments for future billing. I read that others have had difficulty with billing continuing even when the person has died. I would not recommend this Long Term Insurance company to anyone!! I would have given a zero if that was an option.

After reading the above reviews I am really worried about when it comes time to have Transamerica live up to their promises for payment. It IS a Pyramid scheme! What say you, Transamerica? I have been paying into this account for about 18 years. They have a LOT of my money!

This is the most dysfunctional company I have ever dealt with The claims department takes a minimum of 3 times to send a bill each month from long term care facility plus numerous phone calls. The customer service department and claims department don't communicate to each other. I faxed my Fathers death certificate twice to claims then a month later get a notice from the company that his long term care insurance will by dropped if the premium isn't paid.

Well guess what he passed away before the next premium was even due!!! When you try to call the customer service department you are on hold for 1 hr. without the option to leave a call back number. I would NEVER buy a policy from this company!!!!

I would strongly advise against buying Transamerica Long Term Care insurance, and would caution anyone who has it and maybe trying to collect to take detailed written records of attempts to contact them. Run like a shady business, they will give you the runaround for literally months before coming forth with payments -if they ever do.

They must be coaching their employees to put you on hold for long periods of time so you will eventually give up. Or maybe they are waiting for customers to die and hoping no family members will catch their non-payment. Their entire method is to avoid paying. You will spend countless hours trying to get what your policy entitles you to. They are a shady operation out to take your money. If there are any other options look elsewhere.

Transamerica will do ANYTHING not to pay a claim. This is a full time job as a caregiver and continues to be a nightmare. This process started over 4 months ago. I have made over 30 phone calls. I have received so much bad information during this process. We were told my parent needed 3 out the 6 levels of care or have a diagnosis.

My mom has a diagnosis of Alzheimer's. This is a cognitive impairment. They decide if this meets their "Continuous Care" guidelines. Now they are saying she does not have the need for continuous care. The memory test really didn't matter because they look at other things too. DENIED..you need to APPEAL..

They will twist anything and everything. My parents bought this policy 26 years ago so they could continue to live life and know that they would be taken care of. Instead, their children are having to fight for what they rightfully deserve.

Go visit the policy holders in their homes and you will see the level of care they need. When they are cold because they don't know how to turn up the thermostat. When they can't remember how to dial a phone for help. When they are hungry because they forget to eat or remember how to use an appliance. This is what is means to need continuous care.

Well to start, I believe that this company is horrible. Each time we call we get a different representative. Each has a different explanation for why we are not receiving any payments. When the assisted living sends a billing statement we should receive a notification from Transamerica.

We have received this notice only twice. The billing statement does not state which month the bill covers. When questioning the representative for which month it is covering they have no idea. I understand that they don’t pay in advance. Because if we die, then Transamerica would want to be refunded. Go figure!!!!

Now that we understand how frustrating this company is we are told that our payments are under evaluation. Our premium waiver is under consideration. Why????? It is stated in the policy. If you are in an assisted living apartment for over 60 days the premiums are waived. Again total frustration.

We have spoken to a manager who informed us that payment was coming our way and still nothing. We were informed that since leaving the assisted living apartment to go to skilled nursing in the same facility we now needed to start a new claim. Two consecutive months speaking to a manager and other representatives no one said anything about starting a new claim until we asked about the payments due. What is the problem?

Have spent hours and hours on the phone and been given wrong fax number for nursing company to send claims, now they are asking for forms that licensed and insured companies do not need in the state of Florida unless they are medicare companies. Even had our credit card company tried to figure this mess out. I see by reading other comments that they are not credible. I feel that we have been treated in an unprofessional manner. HELP!!!

Transamerica is a company that just can't get their collective acts together! I have a LT Care policy which I originally signed up for through my employer back in 2016. Premiums were deducted out of my paychecks and reflected in my pay stubs.

Upon retirement in November 2017, I was to receive a bill directly from Transamerica for premiums; I chose to be billed annually. Not a problem at first; I received my premium bill for fiscal 2018 in late December 2017 and I paid. That was the LAST TIME I RECEIVED A BILL! I was expecting a bill in December 2018 to pay for fiscal 2019 -- never received.

I called Transamerica that I did not receive a bill for 2019 and was told by a customer rep that they were changing accounting systems and that I would receive a bill sometime in mid-2019, but that my policy was still in effect. No 2019 bill ever came. Now with 2020 coming near, I called Trasamerica again in December 2019 to inquire about receiving a bill for fiscal 2020, as well as for fiscal 2019 which I have yet to receive. This customer rep told me that she would forward my inquiry to Accounting; that was the last I heard of anything!

As of January 8, 2020, I have received or heard nothing! I was willing and ready to pay for both 2020 and 2019, just send me the bill. Oddly, in both 2018 and 2019, Transamerica did send me notices that my premium would be increased (I have a 3% inflation rider)...but no bill! I realize now after reading these less than stellar reviews that I dodged a bullet from Transamerica.

If they can't get it together to send me a bill so they can get paid and profit from my business, then I can only guess how much worse it will be if I ever had to file a claim and hope to be reimbursed! LT Care insurance is very important and should be a part of everyone's financial plan; just not with Transamerica. I will be looking elsewhere. Thank you.

My mother in law has this insurance for nursing home. They dont pay! We fight with them every month. Now they owe her for 2 months and she has premium waver, well that's a joke, they owe her for 2 payments they took out of her account. We have called the insurance commissioner of North Dakota to help us but they get a run around like we do. Going to call the attorney general to see if he can help. DON'T BUY FROM THIS COMPANY. Horrible company.

Just started our first claim and experience has been awful. Finally eligibility was approved for the flat monthly benefit due to her condition. But now we need to send in a form every month, which just states she wants the benefit paid for the month. This type of benefit does not require receipts so why do we need to send in a form just confirming the benefit is still wanted? It's like they are looking for reasons to avoid or delay payment knowing the elderly cannot keep up with all their processes.

I asked, as her POA, to set up the benefit as recurring payments and we'll inform them when it should stop but the agent got rude and said this is reimb plan and the form is needed (even though we are not required to submit receipts) and if I have a problem with that, I should take it up with Consumer Affairs. Wow. AND, they still haven't paid the first pymt...said they needed a manager to correct the way the claim was incorrectly setup on their end. I was going to purchase a plan for myself until I realized that if I didn't have my own POA to fight these battles when I aged into benefits, I would never be able to get them.

This is about my mother-in-law. We waited the 90 days, got approved for service, waited a month or better for reimbursement, and then the premium went up 80%. Then after a few months of this they come back and say that she does not qualify anymore. Her condition has not changed from when this all started. She is only getting service 2 days a week for 2-3hours a day. My wife has called and waited an hour or better.

The last time she called the estimated wait time was 1hour and 45 minutes. Very poor customer service, very poor coverage, and not wanting to pay any claims. When we started having trouble with this my wife and I pulled everything we had with Transamerica. My mother in law has paid for years on this policy. She is now 91 years old and was finally getting some claims paid then they determined that she didn't meet their requirements for reimbursement so now they stopped paying our claims. She will never get even a small fraction of the money back that she has paid in premiums all these years. I only gave them one star since I don't have the option of giving them zero stars. This is a TERRIBLE company.

Wow~ lots of negative comments... My husband and I have had this coverage for almost 20 years. I'm concerned that we will have these same problems when the time comes to use the benefits. We are not eligible health-wise to make a change....yikes..

Consistent with all the other bad reviews. No direct phone numbers or email addresses for the claims department, average hole wait is well over 45 minutes. Once, it was 1 hour and 16 minutes. No return calls for two or more weeks at a time. No claim numbers or paperwork issued. Wow.

The worst company ever.... DO NOT BUY TRANSAMERICA LONG TERM CARE INSURANCE!!! After months of frustration, my mother was approved, then waited the 90 day "elimination period", received 4 checks which took 45 days to process.... It's Sept. 23 and waiting on July payment? Customer service is almost nonexistent, literally takes HOURS to speak to a representative! They are definitely waiting for my mother to die! What a rip-off company!

The policy is good, the customer service process is slow and awful...it takes hours to get information! Then the only person who makes decisions is someone named a "specialist" who has no phone access and seems to be overwhelmed to the point that it takes more than a week to read and process a fax.

They paid a claim on the wrong dates and gave me 2 years more money than they were supposed to...now we have to wait while they fix the problem!! I have a part time job just managing benefits with Transamerica.

Dealing with Transamerica regarding my mother's long term care policy has been & continues to be a nightmare. The customer service is absolutely terrible. TA decided to stop paying mother's LTC benefits after her being in assisted living for 18 months!

How has my 87 year old mother improved, she hasn't, she has macular degeneration and is now legally blind. I filed an appeal 4 months ago, still no decision. We waited 14 months to sell the home she dearly loved, just in case some crap like this happened. I consider what they are doing ELDER ABUSE.

She & my father paid premiums for 20 years and now this! It is outrageous. In the process of gathering all my info for the insurance commissioner. SHAME, SHAME, SHAME ON TRANSAMERICA!

This is ABSOLUTELY THE WORST company to deal with! My parents paid their premiums for her 30 years, always on time! Their premiums were raised several times, but they kept paying. Now my father has dementia and is getting in home care, which was approved by Transamerica. But getting them to actually pay for the care is a nightmare. They currently owe my mother about$10,000! They always have an excuse; "they didn't get the paperwork", "something was missing", "it's being processed, you should get a check in 7 to 10 days". It's always something!!!! Their customer service reps must be trained in stall tactics. My mother is stressed beyond belief and it's just plain cruel to put someone through this that is already stressed caring for their spouse. I am going to file a complaint with insurance commission and researching the possibility of getting a class action suit started against this company.

Getting the claim process took some time/effort but customer service reps during the process and post process have been excellent. After 20 years paying premiums we thought Mom would never receive benefits and as crazy as it sounds, at one time recently we considered cancelling the policy with the last price increase, we are SO thankful we didn't. Robert

The worst customer service ever. This so-called company has taken almost $1000 dollars from our account in the same day. And when I called the home office no one knows anything. They can not find our application nor our policy. This money was twice the amount that was authorized and no one can find our application or our policy. Terrible company.