MetLife Denied Your Life Insurance Claim?
MetLife promises what every insurer promises — pay your premiums, and when the time comes, your family will be taken care of. In litigated cases, that promise hasn't always held. Federal courts have found, more than once, that MetLife collected years of premiums for enhanced coverage, then later denied the very benefit those premiums were paying for — arguing a paperwork step called "evidence of insurability" was never completed. That's a documented, recurring litigated pattern, not a one-off complaint.
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Who Actually Decides Your Claim — MetLife, Metropolitan Tower, or Brighthouse?
"MetLife" is a brand that covers more than one legal entity, and knowing which one issued your policy matters. Metropolitan Life Insurance Company ("MLIC" — NAIC company code 65978, NAIC Group Code 241/0241) is the principal current U.S. group-life issuer and the entity most claimants are dealing with. Metropolitan Tower Life Insurance Company (NAIC company code 97136, domiciled in Nebraska) is a separate insurance company within the same corporate group — a claimant should not assume every "MetLife" policy was legally issued by MLIC itself.
Your "MetLife" Policy May Now Be a Brighthouse Policy
In 2017, MetLife's board approved spinning off Brighthouse Financial, distributing the stock on August 4, 2017, in a separation covering roughly 2.8 million life insurance and annuity contracts. Products previously sold under the MetLife brand were reissued under the Brighthouse Financial brand, issued by Brighthouse Life Insurance Company or, in New York, Brighthouse Life Insurance Company of NY — not guaranteed by MetLife. If your policy or your most recent statement identifies Brighthouse Life Insurance Company, Brighthouse Life Insurance Company of NY, or New England Life Insurance Company as the issuer, your claim is against Brighthouse, not MetLife, regardless of what brand name you remember from when you originally bought the policy. Use the legal issuing-company name printed on your policy or current statement — not the brand name you're used to — to determine who you're actually dealing with.
MetLife's Life Insurance Business Today — and Why It Matters to Your Claim
MetLife's current U.S. companies do not sell new individual life insurance directly to individuals. MetLife's present product disclosures identify MLIC as the issuer of Group Term Life (Policy Form GPN99/G2130-S), Group Universal Life (GUL), and Group Variable Universal Life (GVUL, distributed through MetLife Investors Distribution Company) — meaning the ordinary current MetLife death-claim funnel today is workplace and group coverage, not individual policies purchased directly.
That doesn't mean older individual MetLife policies have disappeared. MetLife maintains a dedicated servicing operation for legacy individual-life policyholders, and those older contracts remain fully relevant to rescission, lapse, beneficiary, and death-claim disputes today — they're simply not how MetLife writes new business.
Employer Group Life (Most Common Today)
- Usually an ERISA employee welfare benefit plan if employer-established or maintained (29 U.S.C. §§ 1002(1), 1003(a))
- Applies to Group Term Life, and typically GUL/GVUL depending on the actual employer plan
- Governmental and specified church plans are ERISA-exempt (29 U.S.C. § 1003(b))
Federal Employees (FEGLI)
- Governed by FEGLIA (5 U.S.C. §§ 8701–8716), not ERISA — a major exception to "workplace group life means ERISA"
- The Office of Personnel Management describes FEGLI as the federal government's group life program, with claims processed through OFEGLI
- Different appeal procedures and deadlines apply than under ERISA
Legacy individual policies not obtained through an employer plan are ordinarily governed by state contract and insurance law rather than ERISA, subject to the actual policy and circumstances.
The Evidence of Insurability Pattern: Premiums Collected, Then a Claim Denied
Federal courts have addressed a recurring litigated fact pattern involving MetLife group life coverage: an employee elects enhanced life coverage above a plan's guaranteed-issue amount, the required medical underwriting step — an Evidence of Insurability (EOI) form — is never obtained or approved, but premiums for the higher coverage amount are deducted from every paycheck anyway. The employee or a covered dependent later dies, and MetLife denies the portion of the claim tied to the unapproved EOI, even though it had been collecting premiums for that exact coverage the whole time.
An employee elected $250,000 of dependent life coverage on her husband. The plan required evidence of insurability above stated limits, but premiums corresponding to the higher coverage were deducted, and neither the employer nor MetLife obtained the required statement of health. After her husband's death, MetLife paid only $30,000 and denied the balance. The Ninth Circuit held the employer acted as MetLife's agent for enforcing the EOI requirement, and that MetLife waived the EOI defense through the premium deductions, its failure to demand EOI, and its coverage representations. This is controlling Ninth Circuit ERISA life authority — especially significant in California.
A similar group-life dispute involving supplemental coverage, evidence-of-insurability and administration issues, and premium deductions. The Eighth Circuit held the claimant could plead ERISA § 502(a)(3) equitable-relief theories where the adequacy of the ordinary benefits remedy hadn't yet been established.
MetLife accepted premiums for dependent life coverage on a dependent who was allegedly no longer eligible, then denied benefits after her death. On rehearing in light of CIGNA Corp. v. Amara, the Fourth Circuit held ERISA § 502(a)(3) potentially allows traditional equitable remedies like surcharge and estoppel — not just a return of premiums paid.
Salyers, Silva, and McCravy support describing this as a recurring litigated issue involving premiums collected before a post-death dispute over eligibility or evidence of insurability. They don't, standing alone, establish that MetLife has a company-wide policy of deliberately collecting unauthorized premiums — but they do show federal courts, across three different circuits, have found in claimants' favor on this exact fact pattern more than once.
Beneficiary Designation Disputes and Interpleader
Not every MetLife life insurance dispute is a denial. Sometimes the underlying benefit isn't in question at all — the dispute is over who's entitled to receive it. A recent, ordinary-life example illustrates this well.
Life proceeds were disputed under the ERISA-governed General Motors Life and Disability Benefits Program after a GM employee died. His purported wife appeared as sole beneficiary of record, while his daughters asserted competing rights. The core issue: whether the employee validly changed his beneficiary during a March 2020 telephone call with MetLife. Rather than pay one claimant while the competing claims remained unresolved, MetLife filed interpleader — asking a court to decide who was entitled to the funds.
This case is worth knowing about specifically because it documents a real, recent MetLife process question — whether a telephone beneficiary change actually complied with the plan's requirements — but it should be understood accurately: MetLife filed this interpleader rather than making a unilateral decision, which is a fundamentally different posture than a denial or a bad-faith judgment against the company. If you're facing a competing beneficiary claim on a MetLife policy, this is the kind of fact pattern — a beneficiary change made verbally, by phone, or informally rather than through a completed form — that often ends up contested this way.
California Life Insurance Law: Contestability, Discretion, and Bad Faith
For an individual MetLife life policy governed by California law, several statutes and cases define what MetLife can and can't do — and what a claimant can recover if it does.
Two-Year Contestability
Cal. Ins. Code § 10113.5 requires California individual life policies to become incontestable once in force during the insured's lifetime for no more than two years, subject to statutory exceptions. Amex Life Assurance Co. v. Superior Court (Slome), 14 Cal. 4th 1231 (1997), is California Supreme Court authority on the strength of that statutory protection — an insurer does not retain an unlimited common-law fraud rescission right once the period has run.
Discretionary Clauses Are Void
Cal. Ins. Code § 10110.6 voids and makes unenforceable a policy provision reserving discretionary authority to an insurer to determine eligibility or interpret the policy, where the statutory conditions apply — and the statute expressly reaches life insurance, not just disability.
Lapse Protections
Cal. Ins. Code §§ 10113.71–.72 require a grace period before lapse and a statutory opportunity to designate another person to receive lapse and termination notices — potentially central where a "denial" is really a dispute over an alleged lapse for nonpayment. McHugh v. Protective Life Insurance Co., 12 Cal. 5th 213 (2021), is California Supreme Court authority applying these protections to older policies.
Bad Faith & Punitive Damages
California's first-party bad faith tort is breach of the insurer's implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing (Gruenberg v. Aetna Insurance Co., 9 Cal. 3d 566 (1973); Egan v. Mutual of Omaha Insurance Co., 24 Cal. 3d 809 (1979)) — not, as sometimes assumed, a private right of action under Cal. Ins. Code § 790.03(h) directly, which Moradi-Shalal v. Fireman's Fund Insurance Cos., 46 Cal. 3d 287 (1988), forecloses. Where oppression, fraud, or malice is established, Cal. Civ. Code § 3294 permits punitive damages beyond the policy benefit itself.
These are genuinely different legal theories — rescission during the contestability period, a denial because coverage allegedly never became effective, a lapse for nonpayment, and an ERISA group-life eligibility or EOI denial are not interchangeable. Salyers, for example, is an eligibility/EOI-waiver case, not an individual-policy contestability or rescission case — which body of law actually applies to your specific situation depends on your policy type and how the denial is framed.
Making a Life Insurance Claim With MetLife
MetLife's current life insurance claims portal offers filing guidance, claim-form assistance, and claim-status tracking.
Individual Life Policies
Call 1-800-638-5000 if your policy number ends in UT, MT, MLU, or MLV. For other individual life policies, call 1-833-642-1007. Confirm your policy type and issuing entity before assuming which number or process applies — MetLife's servicing materials list different lines and numbers for Group Term, GUL, GVUL, and Metropolitan Tower Life policies separately.
What's Typically Required
A separate Claimant's Statement for each beneficiary, a certified death certificate (indicating cause and manner of death), and — for group claims — an Employer's Statement along with enrollment and beneficiary designation information. If a legal guardian is acting for a minor beneficiary, court-issued guardianship papers are typically required as well.
MetLife's public materials don't state a company-wide promised number of days to approve or deny every death claim. For an ERISA-governed employer life plan, the timeline that actually matters legally is the federal claims-procedure deadline below — not a voluntary MetLife promise.
29 C.F.R. § 2560.503-1
An initial decision is generally due within a reasonable period, not later than 90 days after the claim is received, with one extension of up to another 90 days permitted for special circumstances with timely notice. You generally must be given at least 60 days to appeal an adverse decision, and the appeal decision is ordinarily due within 60 days of receipt (up to another 60 days with a compliant extension notice). These deadlines apply to ordinary ERISA-governed group life claims — not to FEGLI, which follows separate FEGLIA procedures instead.
MetLife's Position in the U.S. Life Insurance Market
According to the NAIC's 2025 preliminary Top 25 Groups and Companies by Countrywide Premium — Life Insurance report (based on filings received through March 18, 2026, representing approximately 97.50% of Life, Accident & Health filings received at that point), the Metropolitan Group ranked third nationally in life insurance premium.
Source: NAIC, Life and Fraternal Insurance Industry — 2025 Top 25 Groups and Companies by Countrywide Premium — Life Insurance. This is countrywide direct written premium; the publicly accessible report does not break this figure into individual versus group life or by state, so no state-concentration claim is made here.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes. Federal courts in at least three circuits have addressed a recurring fact pattern where MetLife collected premiums for enhanced life coverage but later denied the claim because a required "evidence of insurability" step was never completed. In Salyers v. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., 871 F.3d 934 (9th Cir. 2017), the Ninth Circuit held MetLife had waived that defense given the premium deductions and its own conduct. Silva v. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., 762 F.3d 711 (8th Cir. 2014), and McCravy v. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., 690 F.3d 176 (4th Cir. 2012), address closely related fact patterns.
Evidence of insurability (EOI) is medical underwriting information required for coverage above a plan's guaranteed-issue amount. Whether MetLife can deny a claim over incomplete EOI after collecting premiums for the higher coverage is exactly the question Salyers v. Metropolitan Life Insurance Co., 871 F.3d 934 (9th Cir. 2017), addressed — the Ninth Circuit found MetLife had waived the EOI defense through premium deductions, its failure to demand the required form, and its own representations about coverage being in force. This is controlling authority in the Ninth Circuit, which includes California.
Yes. In Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. v. Williams, No. 4:24-cv-00357-CLM, 2026 WL 2569485 (N.D. Ala. Aug. 31, 2026), competing beneficiaries disputed whether a telephone beneficiary change complied with the plan's requirements, and MetLife filed interpleader rather than deciding unilaterally between the claimants. If your situation involves a beneficiary change made informally or by phone rather than through a completed form, that's a recognized, currently litigated fact pattern.
It depends on how you obtained the coverage. Most current MetLife life business is employer-sponsored group coverage, which is usually governed by ERISA if the employer established or maintains the plan. Federal employee coverage (FEGLI) is governed by FEGLIA instead, a separate federal law with its own procedures. Legacy individual policies not obtained through an employer are typically governed by state contract and insurance law. Governmental and specified church employer plans are exempt from ERISA even though they involve group coverage.
Possibly not. In 2017, MetLife spun off Brighthouse Financial, transferring roughly 2.8 million life insurance and annuity contracts to the new company. Products previously sold under the MetLife brand were reissued under Brighthouse Life Insurance Company, Brighthouse Life Insurance Company of NY, or New England Life Insurance Company. Check the legal issuing-company name on your policy or most recent statement — if it names a Brighthouse entity, your claim is against Brighthouse, not MetLife, regardless of the brand name on your original paperwork.
Under 29 C.F.R. § 2560.503-1, an ERISA-governed group life plan must generally decide an initial claim within 90 days, with one permitted 90-day extension for special circumstances. You must be given at least 60 days to appeal an adverse decision, and the appeal itself is ordinarily due within 60 days (extendable by another 60 days). These deadlines don't apply to FEGLI, which follows separate federal procedures.
Potentially significant protection. Cal. Ins. Code § 10113.5 makes a California individual life policy incontestable after two years in force, and California courts have limited how far an insurer can go to rescind after that period. Cal. Ins. Code § 10110.6 voids discretionary-authority clauses in qualifying life policies. If MetLife's conduct is oppressive, fraudulent, or malicious, California's bad-faith framework — rooted in Gruenberg v. Aetna and Egan v. Mutual of Omaha — can support damages beyond the policy benefit itself, including punitive damages under Cal. Civ. Code § 3294.
Start at MetLife's Life Insurance Claims portal online. For individual life policies, call 1-800-638-5000 if your policy number ends in UT, MT, MLU, or MLV, or 1-833-642-1007 for other individual policies. You'll typically need a separate Claimant's Statement per beneficiary, a certified death certificate, and — for a group claim — an Employer's Statement with enrollment information. Confirm your specific policy type and issuing entity first, since MetLife lists different contact numbers for different product lines.
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