How To Get Stressed

I've previous talked here about how stress seems to help bring on at least some of my symptoms. Here's an example of how the company who now operate my permanent health insurance, Phoenix ("part of the Resolution Group") help bring stress into my life.

My PHI policy was with Swiss Life (UK) but they stopped writing new business here a while ago and their business of now run by Pheonix/Resolution who appear to specialise in mopping up closed insurance companies. Fair enough, someone's got to do it, for example my claim could run on for another fifteen years.

The problem with Phoenix is two fold. Firstly they seem to find it very hard to understand what they're dealing with. As I'm working now, when I can, for The Hug and the company can afford to pay me a little I'm on "proportional benefit". That is to say I get a reduced benefit based on a fairly simple formula relating to my old income, the sum assured and the amount I'm losing from no longer being entitled state benefits (incapacity benefit - to which I was entitled and did claim initially) because I'm now working.

In order for them to verify what I'm earning they need figures from me. As I earn relatively little at present I currently pay myself once a year. The way the cycle works is that I do the company accounts shortly after the year end on 31st December, then look at the money left in the bank and in about February pay myself and declare a dividend. So Phoenix want to see a copy of the company accounts, my P60 and my dividend voucher. All of these I can supply (although does sometimes amuse me to consider that as I'm my own accountant and generate all these documents myself with no independent audit I'm not sure how much real value they have).

It seemed to take a long time for Phoenix to get their head around the way I was working and to understand the documents they had been sent. In particular they got thoroughly confused over which year various documents related. But I politely and patiently replied to each letter I got and eventually I thought I'd won the battle and everyone understood where we were.

And then things went awry. On 6th August I got a letter thanking me for all the figures I'd provided and saying that, having reviewed them and done the maths, they calculated that I owed them around £6,000 in benefit which they had overpaid me over the previous two years.

When I'd picked myself up off the floor I looked at their calculation and realised that they had omitted to include the incapacity benefit in their calculation. Putting that back in removed the £6,000 at a stroke.

I replied on the day I received their letter. It wasn't as polite as those which had gone before. I detailed what I thought were the correct calculations and ended thus:

Which brings me on to the second problem with Phoenix. They take a month to reply to any letter. It's so precise that I'm starting to suspect that it's not that it's taking them a month to consider my letter but they're not actually looking at it until three weeks after they receive it.

I spent the weeks after I'd sent the letter worrying about it. On the last night of our honeymoon (we got married in late August) I remember lying awake wondering what I'd find on our doormat when we got home.

What arrived was a letter confirming their mistake and apologising for the error.

It had only taken five weeks to receive it ...