Policies in a row

Put the policies in a row while you are alive. For each policy the name of the insurer, the policy number and in a few words what the insurance is about, such as household contents, liability, death or a funeral. Note where the paper or the file is. A folder, a portal of the insurer or the folder of the intermediary. The name of that intermediary and a telephone number belong with it if you have them. The list is a map of what is in force. It is not an overview of money that is released later. Update a policy when you stop it, and take a stopped policy off the list or add the end date, so that it is not read as still in force.

Do not write down the payout you hope for. An amount from memory, a round figure or a sum you remember from a conversation is not a source. The policy itself says what was agreed, and you read that text only when you have the document in front of you. Until then an amount field stays empty. The beneficiary is unknown until the policy has been read. So do not, out of habit, put the name of your partner or of a child as the recipient. Sometimes someone else is named, sometimes the estate, sometimes no one you expect. That outcome belongs with the document, not with an assumption in the file. At most note that the beneficiary designation is in the policy and still has to be checked.

Insurance on your life is not a will. It pays out according to its own text, to whoever is named there. The life file does not thereby appoint an heir or an executor. Those roles stay in a notarial will, if you want them. Here too, do not store a password for the insurer's portal. Invited readers can see the file. A login does not belong there. You do not use DigiD as a key to describe that policy, and you do not store that login. Ervazo stores the names and the numbers you type in. The program does not send them to the insurer and not to a notary. The list with a date is enough for this page.

A life file is a note for later. It is not a will, not a medical instruction and not advice. The policy list points to the documents. It promises no payout and it names no beneficiary for as long as the policy has not been read. A codicil has its own, strictly handwritten form and does not turn this list into a deed. Ervazo does not send the note to a doctor or a notary. Whoever later wants to know what a policy does reads the policy or calls the insurer with the number you have kept. Until that reading, an amount stays empty and a name stays an open question.