Life insurance: All you need to know about beneficiaries

When you take out a life insurance, the policyholder must designate one or more beneficiaries to receive the death benefits. What happens if the beneficiaries do not come forward?

Life insurance provides payment of a capital to the beneficiaries designated by the policyholder. There exist two types of beneficiaries in the life insurance: the primary beneficiary and the secondary beneficiary (contingent beneficiary).

The primary beneficiaries of a life insurance policy

If the designated beneficiaries do not come forth, the primary beneficiaries receive the death benefit. The primary beneficiaries are those who were fully responsible to the policyholder until the day of decease. This person need not exercise professional activity. When there are multiple primary beneficiaries, the capital is paid forth in the following order of priority: first to the spouse or partner bound by a PACS (contract of civil union), then to the children and finally to the parents or grandparents.
In the case where there are multiple primary beneficiaries of the same rank, the capital of the deceased is divided into equal parts and shared between them.

Attention: the status of the primary beneficiary is only valid during the course of the first month following the death of the insured. When this period is exceeded, the primary beneficiaries become secondary beneficiaries and have a period of two years from the date of death to file their application for death benefits.

The Secondary Beneficiaries

Secondary beneficiaries are those who are not completely responsible to the insured deceased party. When no primary beneficiaries have submitted a request for capital in the first month following the date of death of the insured, secondary beneficiaries can file a claim for death benefits. The order of priority is as follows: first, to the spouse or partner bound by a PACS (contract of civil union), failing that, to the descendants, and failing that, to the parents or to the grandparents.

When there are several secondary beneficiaries of the same rank, the death benefits are shared and received in equal parts. They are granted a period of two years from the date of death to file their application for death benefits from the insurer.