A lost or missing life insurance policy can create majorproblems when handling the affairs of a decedent. The PolicyLocator Service, provided by e-Services Corporation, a wholly ownedsubsidiary of the MIB Group, Inc., may help track down unknown orlost life insurance policies.

The key to the service is MIB's industrywide database. MIB'snearly 500 member companies write approximately 95 percent of allpremium dollars for individually underwritten life insurance in theU.S. and Canada. The Policy Locator Service database records thesubmission of an application to MIB's fraud detection service. Thatapplication activity can lead consumers to discover the existenceof lost or unknown policies. The database currently contains morethan 120 million records representing applications processed duringthe last 10 years; more than 10 million records are addedannually.

"There is no central database of in-force life insurancepolicies in North America," says MIB vice president RobertDiAngelo. "MIB's role in fraud detection puts us at the hub of thelife insurance underwriting process, giving consumers an easy wayto determine if a deceased loved one had applied for lifeinsurance."