Guardian Life Insurance
- The company offers a full menu of term, whole, universal and variable universal life insurance.
- It scores average across the board on customer satisfaction measures from J.D. Power.
Overview
Headquartered in New York City, Guardian Life Insurance Co. is a mutual insurance company, meaning it’s owned by its policyholders. The company has paid a dividend every year since 1868, and in 2015 it paid out a record dividend of $838.6 million to its policyholders.
NerdWallet rank: 3rd
Guardian ranked No. 3 out of 18 large companies scored by NerdWallet. NerdWallet’s life insurance company rankings combine its A.M. Best rating, consumer complaints and J.D. Power’s customer satisfaction score.
A.M. Best financial strength rating: A++ (superior)
Guardian’s financial strength is “superior,” according to ratings agency A.M. Best.
Financial strength is important because it indicates how well an insurer can pay claims. It’s especially important when choosing a life insurance company because claims might not be made until many decades after a policy is purchased.
Consumer complaints: Better than the median
Guardian drew far fewer than the median number of complaints to state regulators in 2015 for a company of its size, according to the latest data from the National Association of Insurance Commissioners.
The association assigns a complaint ratio score to insurance companies, based on the number of complaints to state insurance commissioners, adjusted for market share. The median score is 1. A score less than 1 means fewer complaints. MetLife’s score for individual life insurance in 2015 was .04.
J.D. Power ratings: AVERAGE
Guardian scored “about average” in all categories of a 2016 J.D. Power customer service survey. The insurer ranked No. 12 overall out of 21 companies included in the survey.
| Guardian customer satisfaction scores | |
|---|---|
| Overall satisfaction | About average |
| Billing and payment | About average |
| Price | About average |
| Policy offerings | About average |
| Interaction | About average |
| Source: J.D. Power 2016 U.S. Life Insurance Study | |
Guardian Life Insurance coverage options
| Types of life insurance sold | Other products and services |
|---|---|
The company added new features in the past year to its term and whole life insurance products. They include:
- An “Index Participation Feature,” which lets whole life policyholders link a portion of their cash value to the Standard & Poor’s 500 index.
- A “Lifetime Protection Builder,” designed for people who want to convert term life to whole life insurance in intervals. Policies with this feature provide 15 years of temporary insurance coverage, which is reduced on the fifth, 10th and 15th anniversaries. Policyholders have opportunities at each of those intervals to purchase whole life coverage.
- Greater flexibility for policyholders who want to borrow against the cash value in their whole life insurance policies. They can choose between fixed or variable loan interest rates when they take out loans on the policies’ 10th anniversaries.
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