The Vermont Statutes Online

Title 8 : Banking and Insurance

Chapter 103 : Life Insurance Policies and Annuity Contracts

Subchapter 005 : Group Life Insurance

• § 3805. Debtor groups

  The lives of a group of individuals may be insured under a policy issued to a creditor or to the trustees of a fund established by one or more creditors, which creditor or trustees shall be deemed the policyholder, to insure debtors of the creditor or creditors subject to the following requirements:

  (1) The debtors eligible for insurance under the policy shall be all of the debtors of the creditor or creditors or all of any class or classes thereof determined by conditions pertaining to the indebtedness or to the purchase giving rise to the indebtedness. The policy may provide that the term “debtors” shall include the debtors of one or more subsidiary corporations, and the debtors of one or more affiliated corporations, proprietors, or partnerships if the business of the policyholder and of such affiliated corporations, proprietors, or partnerships, is under common control through stock ownership, contract, or otherwise.

  (2) The premium for the policy shall be paid by the policyholder, either from the creditor’s or creditors’ funds, or from charges collected from the insured debtors, or from both. A policy on which part or all of the premium is to be derived from the collection from the insured debtors of identifiable charges not required of uninsured debtors shall not include, in the class or classes of debtors eligible for insurance, debtors under obligations outstanding at its date of issue without evidence of individual insurability unless at least 75 percent of the then eligible debtors elect to pay the required charges. A policy on which no part of the premium is to be derived from the collection of such identifiable charges must insure all eligible debtors, or all except any as to whom evidence of individual insurability is not satisfactory to the insurer.

  (3) The policy may be issued only if the group of eligible debtors is then receiving new entrants at the rate of at least 100 persons yearly, or may reasonably be expected to receive at least 100 new entrants during the first policy year, and only if the policy reserves to the insurer the right to require evidence of individual insurability if less than 75 percent of the new entrants become insured. The policy may exclude from the classes eligible for insurance classes of debtors determined by age.

  (4) The amount of insurance on the life of any debtor shall at no time exceed the amount owed to the creditor, or creditors or $70,000.00 whichever is less, except that the amount of such insurance on the life of a debtor who has secured a debt by a mortgage on real estate shall at no time exceed $140,000.00, or the amount owed, whichever is less. Where the insurance is in connection with an educational or agricultural credit transaction commitment, the amount owed by the debtor to any creditor may be deemed to include the portion of the loan commitment that has not been advanced by the creditor.

  (5) The insurance shall be payable to the policyholder or creditor. Such payment shall reduce or extinguish the unpaid indebtedness of the debtor to the extent of such payment. (Added 1967, No. 344 (Adj. Sess.), § 1 (ch. 2, subch. 6, § 5); amended 1973, No. 222 (Adj. Sess.), § 3, eff. April 3, 1974; 1989, No. 249 (Adj. Sess.), § 2, eff. June 16, 1990; 2009, No. 42, § 10.)