Met Life May Hike Refund Estimate

Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. on Tuesday said the number of policyholders who were misled when they bought life insurance policies could be higher than its latest estimate of 30,000 to 45,000.

Met Life on Monday said it would expand its offer of refunds to customers, who may have been misled by sales brochures, beyond those who bought policies from its Tampa, Fla., office. It earlier offered refunds in about 6,000 cases involving life insurance policies sold from that office.

As a result, the company expected to pay refunds totaling between $20 million and $30 million. The company today acknowledged that its estimate was merely a “ballpark figure” and may be revised.

“These amounts could go higher, but we just don’t know how high,” Met Life spokesman Charles Sahner said. “We felt we had to put a number on it, but it’s such an early stage.”

The sales practices at Met Life, the nation’s biggest seller of life insurance, are under investigation in at least 15 states. Florida, Texas and New York have decided to discipline the company for using sales literature that touted the policies as investments or retirement plans instead of life insurance.

Even if the dollar amount of the estimate should double, the company said, the financial impact should be relatively slight.