Worth doing a designation of beneficiary?

[sparkofcreation 0]

I posted here: http://www.visajourney.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=31513 about my lack of evidence since moving cross-country--we no longer have joint utilities or joint health insurance cards.

Today I asked my HR person for a letter showing who was the beneficiary of my job's life insurance and pension. She emailed me back that I hadn't filled out a designation of beneficiary form yet (I thought I had, I know G. had to sign a bunch of stuff when I took the job), but if I wanted, she could write me a letter saying that my life insurance would be distributed in the normal order of precedence, which would be the first of 1. spouse (if any), 2. children (if any), 3. parents (if living) ... and so on.

Doing an actual designation-of-beneficiary form could take up to a month (and is a huge hassle involving filling out multiple copies of forms, signing in front of witnesses, etc.), and even if I do one, I'll only have just now done one, if you know what I mean.

My question is, do you think that a letter saying that my life insurance will go to my spouse is enough, or should I do a designation-of-beneficiary form, or should I not bother?

[meauxna 15]

B, I don't see the point---sounds like the designation would be if you wanted the money to go to someone *other* than your spouse.

[sparkofcreation 0]

B, I don't see the point---sounds like the designation would be if you wanted the money to go to someone *other* than your spouse.

Right, that would be the primary reason to do one, but the advantage would be that instead of saying "Bethany has a life insurance policy, the beneficiary is her spouse if any" it would say "Bethany has a life insurance policy, the beneficiary is her husband Gareth."

[meauxna 15]

B, I don't see the point---sounds like the designation would be if you wanted the money to go to someone *other* than your spouse.

Right, that would be the primary reason to do one, but the advantage would be that instead of saying "Bethany has a life insurance policy, the beneficiary is her spouse if any" it would say "Bethany has a life insurance policy, the beneficiary is her husband Gareth."

Yeah, I'm with you. Now you have two pionts to weigh against each other: Value of the evidence vs hassle of getting it.

[Badgerbabe 0]

Just a thought - if you have a checking/savings/cd just in your name you can put a benficiary on those really easily - it's called a POD - Payment on death

You'd have a copy of the forms as evidence

[sparkofcreation 0]

B, I don't see the point---sounds like the designation would be if you wanted the money to go to someone *other* than your spouse.

Right, that would be the primary reason to do one, but the advantage would be that instead of saying "Bethany has a life insurance policy, the beneficiary is her spouse if any" it would say "Bethany has a life insurance policy, the beneficiary is her husband Gareth."

Yeah, I'm with you. Now you have two pionts to weigh against each other: Value of the evidence vs hassle of getting it.

It actually turned out that I was able to get our HR person to explain to me how to fill out the form (it wanted to know my "Department, Bureau, Division, Location" and all I was sure of was the last one!) and two HR people were able to witness my signature (I'd thought when I posted that I had to find two witnesses on my own) and so it wasn't that much of a hassle after all. We'll see if the paperwork comes through in time, but at least I have copies of the application.

I hope it makes people feel somewhat better to know that working for the federal government is just as much hassle as dealing with immigration ... and yes, our fingerprint checks take just as long to complete.

Just a thought - if you have a checking/savings/cd just in your name you can put a benficiary on those really easily - it's called a POD - Payment on death

You'd have a copy of the forms as evidence

Not really. We each have a personal checking account that we keep minimal amounts of money in for our personal, none-of-your-business-if-I-want-to-buy-something-expensive-with-my-money use, but mainly we use our joint checking and savings accounts. (The problem with those is the subject of the other post I linked to.)

Edited September 22, 2006 by sparkofcreation