Asteron starts review after fraud

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Asteron Life has reviewed its processes and introduced new controls after being hit by a fraudulent life insurance claim.

Sunday, September 3rd 2017, 6:00AM 2 Comments

Rotorua woman Mary-Rose Ponce Caldero faked her death in 2015 and posed as someone else to claim $800,000 from the insurer, with whom she had a policy in her maiden name.

The next year, she took out another policy with Pinnacle Life, again with her maiden name, for $1 million.

Her mother was listed as the beneficiary. She tried to claim the next month, saying she had died of a heart attack.

Also in 2016, she took another policy for AA Life in another name and tried again to claim. The second two claims were flagged as fraudulent and policy began to investigate.

She was sentenced in April to three years and two months in prison.

A spokeswoman for Asteron Life said it had a robust claims investigations process in place.

"However, in this case a highly unusual set of circumstances resulted in the claim being paid. We have since reviewed our process and introduced some further controls to protect our customers, our people and our business from the negative impact of insurance fraud."

Tags: Asteron

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