Compare Insurance Quotes
About Family Heritage
Family Heritage Life was founded in Ohio in 1989 and quickly began to expand across the country. After twenty years in business they hit the 200,000 policy mark, and in 2012 became part of Torchmark Corporation as a wholly owned subsidiary.
FHL writes a variety of life insurance policies as well as specialty health insurance coverage designed to provide extra coverage for specific accidents and illnesses, including cancer care and heart attack or stroke.
FHL still has headquarters in Cleveland, Ohio, but also maintains executive offices in McKinley, Texas. They are licensed in 49 states and products are sold through local agents.
Family Heritage Products
The website offers a brief description of each of the products FHL offers, all of which appear to be very straightforward.
Life insurance is available for adults and children. The plan appears to be a whole life insurance policy with simplified issue, meaning there is no medical exam required. We were unable to locate information on benefit amounts, although with simplified issue plans they are usually on the lower end.
Accident insurance is available to help pay for medical and related costs in case of an accident. This includes ambulance, physical therapy, and hospital costs.
Cancer policies provide coverage for diagnosis, treatment, and other cancer-related costs that are not covered by regular health insurance. Heart attack and stroke policies provide similar extended coverage. These policies also help with other bills outside of the medical costs.
Intensive Care policies cover things like air ambulance costs, the cost of ICU care and step down unit, and other costs associated with sudden injury or illness.
Finally, FHL offers Hospital Indemnity insurance, which covers hospital costs that are out of pocket under standard health insurance.
FHL Rates
Online quoting is not offered for FHL policies. We would expect that their rates, particularly for life insurance, would be somewhat competitive since they do not have as much name recognition as other companies and have a very specific policy focus.
Quotes can be obtained by contacting an FHL agent or the company directly.
Claims
FHL offers a variety of claims information that differs for each product. Their claims page has a drop-down menu for each option. The site states that claims are only accepted by mail or fax for the purposes of assuring confidentiality. Online filing is not offered, but forms can be downloaded easily.
Claims on policies less than two years old are subject to additional information and review. There is a life insurance claims line that can be called with questions or for assistance, but claims cannot be filed that way.
Ratings and Consumer Reviews
FHL has an A+ rating with the Better Business Bureau (BBB), and there have been 17 total complaints against the company in the past three years. Of those, two were closed in the past year. Most of the complaints are in regards to policy cancellations that were not processed correctly. One can be disregarded as it appears to be posted for the wrong company and is about a washing machine repair bill.
There are both positive and negative comments about FHL on Complaints Board. Some of them are similar to the billing issues on the BBB site. Others complain about pushy salespeople or misunderstandings regarding what was actually covered by the plan.
Overall, there is nothing alarming in these complaints.
The Bottom Line
FHL is a niche company that sells supplemental health and basic simplified life insurance. They appear to do some door-to-door marketing based on reviews, which may put some people off. While there is nothing discouraging about this company, there is also not enough information to clearly recommend them.
For a list of companies that we recommend, visit our Best Insurance Companies page.
Compare Insurance Quotes
Review Information
I am a former insurance agent and banker turned consumer advocate. My priority is to help educate individuals and families about the different types of insurance they need, and assist them in finding the best place to get it.
Sara says
Family Heritage has been a Godsend! I was diagnosed with breast cancer shortly after securing the FH insurance. I had absolutely no family history of cancer & even was BRACA negative. I took it out truly because of the tanning I did as a kid & thought it might be good for a skin cancer risk, never thought I’d have any other type of cancer! I had great health insurance & my out of pocket expenses still topped 50k. The insurance from FH meant the world to me. I am confident it kept me from having to declare bankruptcy! I turned in my initial paperwork & within 2 weeks I had 6,000 for the first occurrence in my account! My agent was wonderful, helped me & made sure I got everything I could. It made dealing with my cancer so much easier. I didn’t have to worry about the care or how I could pay for it!!!! When I had to call the company they were amazingly helpful, respectful and did exactly what they said they’d do. I can not recommend this company and their policies more. I only had cancer & ICU. I have since added anything I could buy from them. I pray the everyone considers it. It was one of the very best things I have ever done. I thank God for them every day!
Frank Sims says
Not a big fan of Family Heritage insurance. Paid big bucks for top-tier accident insurance, had an accident and they paid a whopping $450.00 to me. I paid more than $100 a month for this kind of payout. I had 2 other accident insurance policies, monthly cost $12 and $13. They paid for the same accident $1380 and $1450. So as one can see, it doesn’t appear that Family Heritage Ins. is worth the cost at all
Denise says
Yes we have had family heritage for years but all of sudden there was no more payments taken out do not understand why..need to contact someone about this.
Sunny Pike says
Call the company and find out.
If your coverage lapses, that is your responsibility.
Kendra says
They deliberately take out your money the day before payday so they can charge fees that equal more than the payments. I’d say this is a scam. Thank goodness I haven’t had to file a claim, or I’d probably be double screwed. Go elsewhere!
Sunny Pike says
First of all, I am a Licensed Agent selling for Family Heritage, so I know the facts.
Family Heritage gives you the option to choose any day of the month to have your payment extracted from your bank account, with the exception of 29th, 30th, 31st, (because of the month of February).
And how exactly would Family Heritage know when every single customer’s “payday” is?
That doesn’t even make common sense. There are over 10,000 million policy owners.
In addition, customers can change the payment date at their option any time they choose.