Copyright held by The John Cooke Fraud Report. Reprint rights are granted with attribution to The John Cooke Fraud Report with a link to this website.
WE MAY INDEED BE DOOMED — THREE CALLS THE CHARM
By Anonymous
Beginning Blood Pressure: 115/72.
First Call: To an A+ Best’s rated (Superior) life/health insurance company.
Company: Gigantic Insurance Company, how may I direct your call?
Caller: I’d like to talk to someone in your Fraud Department.
Company: Ugh, we don’t have a fraud department.
Caller: Perhaps you refer to it as a Special Investigations Department?
Company: No, we don’t have one of those.
Caller: Well, where would a person report a suspected fraud?
Company: I don’t think that we have any fraud at Gigantic Insurance Company.
(Blood pressure: 124/80)
Caller: Can you put me through to someone in your life claims department?
Company: Certainly. I’ll connect you.
ANNOYING MUSIC
(Blood pressure: 126/80)
Company: Claims. This is Suzi.
Caller: Suzi, if I wanted to report a fraudulent life claim, who would I talk to.
Company: I have no idea. Gigantic doesn’t have fraudulent life claims.
Caller: Well, what if you did? Do you have an investigative department?
Company: Not that I am aware of. Would you like me to ask my supervisor?
Caller. Please. Ask your supervisor.
Company: I asked her. She doesn’t know either. She said that we don’t have fraud claims.
(Blood Pressure 128/82)
Second Call: To an Attorney General’s Office of a very large state:
AG Operator: Very Large State Attorney General Office. How may I direct your call?
Caller: May I speak to someone in the Insurance Fraud Section?
AG: What is this regarding?
Caller: It’s concerning a life insurance fraud; a death within your jurisdiction.
AG: Hold please.
ANNOYING MUSIC
(Blood pressure: 130/82)
AG: Insurance Division,
Caller: To whom am I speaking, please?
AG: We do not give out our names. I am the desk agent. Who would you like to speak to?
Caller: If you don’t have names, how can I ask for someone?
AG: I’ll connect you. (HUH?)
Connection to a buzz and “Leave your message at the tone.”
(Blood pressure: 136/84)
INFURIATING. Call back. Same Desk Agent.
Caller: I believe that we were mistakenly cut off. I’d like to speak to a fraud investigator.
AG: Consumers can report a suspected fraud on our web site.
Caller: I am not a consumer. I am an investigator. I have some information for you on a fraud within your jurisdiction.
AG: Who do you want to speak to?
Caller: I do not have a name, you do not use names, I just want to speak to an investigator.
AG: Hold please.
ANNOYING MUSIC
(Blood pressure 144/86)
AG: Office of something-or-other. How can we assist you?
Caller: I’d like to speak to an investigator in your insurance fraud department.
Office of Something-or-other: This office is a legislative lobbying office. How can we help you?
Caller: You can reconnect me to the Insurance Fraud section.
Office of Something-or-other: Hold please.
LINE GOES DEAD.
(Blood pressure: 152/86)
Start over. Three more switch overs and we reach a live body.
Caller: I have some detailed information for you regarding a death in your jurisdiction that appears to be a small part of a national life insurance fraud ring.
AG: That would be Homicide. Hold please.
Homicide: Homicide. How can I direct your call?
Caller: I have some detailed information for you regarding a death in your jurisdiction that appears to be a small part of a national life insurance fraud ring. Who can I talk to?
Homicide: You need the insurance fraud department. Hold please.
(Blood pressure: 156/88)
Caller: Homicide believes that I need to talk to you, not them, as this is an insurance matter that just happens to involve a suspected homicide.
AG: Then you have to file a consumer complaint on our web site and we’ll make a determination and get back to you.
Caller: I am not a consumer. I am an investigator. All I want is to speak to an investigator, not a receptionist.
(Blood pressure: 160/90)
AG: I am transferring you now.
(Blood Pressure 150/84)
ANSWERING MACHINE (This guy is “out of the office” indefinitely!)
(Blood Pressure: 164/92)
Slam down receiver. Make the personal determination that the collective IQ of this entire division is 16.
(Blood pressure: 166/92)
Third Call: To the DOI of that same Very Large State Department of Insurance: Hold please.
Seven minutes of ANNOYING MUSIC
DOI: This is Maria, thank you for holding, how may I direct your call?
Caller: Fraud Division, please.
DOI: Transferring. Answered by a recording giving instructions about the web site. Lots of instructions. Back on hold.
(Blood pressure: 172/94 — took two aspirins just to be safe)
Two more switches to reach a “Life Insurance Fraud Investigator” after being told that they did not have one of those, but “Raymond” knew a little bit about it. (Names have been changed, etc.)
Raymond: I only take reports when the policy has been fraudulently obtained.
Caller: What if it is obtained as part of a plot to KILL the named insured in order to profit?
Raymond: They couldn’t do that unless the named insured signed it.
Caller: Are you kidding me? Please, tell me that you are kidding me.
Raymond: He also has to pee in a cup and have blood drawn.
Caller: And if his cousin shows up for the exam and says he is the insured?
Raymond: That’s not legal.
Caller: So if there is definitive information that it happened that way, to whom do we make the report?
Raymond: That’s a matter for the Attorney General. Would you like their number?
(Blood pressure: 185/97)
[color-box color=”gray”]Epilogue:
There is a point in time when good efforts go without reward.
There is a point in time when the right hand is on Mars and the left hand is on Uranus.
There is a point in time when industry does not talk to one another because one side can’t talk and the other side can’t listen.
There is a point in time when bad guys ride like rodeo cowboys because good guys are so busy reading scripts and passing the buck, that the rodeos are uninterrupted.
There is a point in time when all the teaching materials in the world do not have an effect because the classroom has forgotten how to learn.
There is a point in time when we must examine our collective shortcomings and do something about them.
There is a point in time when regression sucks and aggression is called for.
It is that point in time.[/color-box]
