I’ve shared quite a bit about insurance rights protection and dispute and complaints handling before. Unfortunately, I’ve personally fallen into the traps set by insurance agents — not once, but twice — both resulting in rights protection complaints. Let me share my own experiences with these pitfalls, then some tips on how to avoid unreliable insurance agents:

👎🏻 Recommending Investment Products Without First Securing Basic Coverage

When this insurance agent first helped my husband and me with our insurance planning, his recommendations were simple: whole life insurance + term life insurance + critical illness rider + an ILP.

What he never asked — or even mentioned — was whether we had any hospitalization coverage. Years later, after learning more about insurance and financial planning myself, I realized my husband had been “uninsured” all along: he had no personal hospitalization coverage at all. 😱

The one thing I’m still grateful for is that I resisted his repeated persuasion to buy ILPs. At the time, I found them too rigid and inflexible. Otherwise, I’d have even more regrets today if I purchased. Compared to some of the slightly better 101 ILPs available now, traditional ILPs were expensive, full of pitfalls, and widely criticized — you’ll find no shortage of horror stories online from people who surrendered these policies.

👎🏻 Pushing You to Surrender Old Policies and Buy New Ones Without Explaining Pros and Cons

Later on, this agent switched to a new company and transferred our policies to one of his colleagues. The first complaint I filed stemmed from his colleague mishandling this transfer — but I won’t dive into that again here.

During that period, both the agent and his colleague persuaded us to cancel our existing whole life insurance and replace it with a new whole life policy. Looking back, when we signed the new policy, neither agent properly explained the pros and cons or disclosed any fees. All they said was: “This product is better than your old one — many clients have already switched.” 🤷🏻‍♀️

At the time, my husband and I knew very little about financial planning or insurance regulations. We didn’t know how to evaluate policies, we couldn’t understand the contracts, and we weren’t aware that agents were obligated to disclose details like expected returns and fee structures. Now, I realize the real motivation behind this recommendation was likely the high commissions agents receive in the first two years - the “new policy” was pushed to us exactly 2 years after our old policy.

👎🏻 Blaming Slow Claims Processing on the Insurance Company

While this agent was generally responsive to texts and messages, he was painfully slow when it came to handling claims. Our first major hospitalization claim took almost three months to get approved. At first, I was understanding, assuming that the insurer’s review process simply took time.

It wasn’t until I lost trust and contacted the insurance company directly that I found out the real issue: he had forgotten to submit the claim entirely — yet he told me the delay was due to slow processing by the insurer. I was deeply disappointed by this dishonest attitude.

👎🏻 Lack of Policy Knowledge and Failure to Advocate for Clients

This incident led to my second complaint to the insurance company and ultimately to MAS. The agent completely misunderstood the terms of our Integrated Shield Plan (IP) and seriously misled us. If I had simply trusted him without doing my own research, we could have made the wrong medical decisions for cancer treatment.

In reality, many insurance agents haven’t read the product terms thoroughly. Even if you ask them for clarification, you may not get accurate answers. But their attitude makes all the difference: do they approach your questions with the same level of caution and thoroughness you would? Do they proactively contact the insurer to advocate on your behalf? This makes a huge difference.

⭐️ What Should You Do If You Encounter an Unreliable Insurance Agent?

• Communicate in writing and request clear explanations of your policy terms and disclosures.
• If there is misinformation or non-disclosure during the sales process, gather evidence and file a complaint with MAS (Monetary Authority of Singapore).
• If the dispute involves financial losses, gather evidence and escalate to FIDReC (Financial Industry Disputes Resolution Centre).
• If you’re simply dissatisfied with the service but no serious misconduct occurred, file a complaint with the insurance company and request immediate reassignment.