§ 1515.Funds Held Or Owing By Life Insurance Corporation Under Life Or Endowment Insurance Policy Or Annuity Contract

Life insurance proceeds present a particular problem: sometimes no one notifies the insurer that the insured has died, so the money sits untouched. Section 1515 escheats funds owed under a matured or terminated policy or annuity contract if they go unclaimed and unpaid for more than three years after becoming due and payable according to the insurer's own records. When the person entitled to the funds is not the insured or annuitant, and that person's address is unknown or unclear from the insurer's records, the section presumes their last known address matches the insured's, a presumption that shifts the burden of proof rather than settling the question outright.

The section also solves the no-death-certificate problem directly. A policy not yet matured by proof of the insured's death is nonetheless deemed matured, with proceeds due and payable, if the insured has reached or would have reached the mortality table's limiting age, the policy was still in force at that point, and no one connected to the policy has adjusted it, borrowed against it, or corresponded about it in the preceding three years. And funds are deemed due and payable under this section even if the policy itself was never physically surrendered as the contract would otherwise require.