
New York Life Reviews
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About New York Life
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New York Life offers life insurance as well as other financial services. Term and permanent policies are available, including whole, universal and variable universal life policies. With nine optional riders, customers can increase coverage, getting access to funds in case of disability, accident or market downturn.
- Riders available
- No medical exam
- Coverage calculator
- No online application
New York Life Reviews
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Reviewed April 8, 2025
This company, New York Life was recommended by a friend so I took the plunge. Months later, I had not received any communications on my investment. I reached out to my friend to find out what was going on...Soon after, a meeting was set up. I entered the meeting to find the room full of People. SO apologetic, blah blah blah...to this date, I have not heard from this company since meeting. Almost a year.
Reviewed April 4, 2025
My company provided LTD coverage through NYL. They have been totally uncooperative and absolutely dishonest. Unfortunately they are regulated by ERiSA which gives them the legal right to deny claims for any reason, despite conclusive evidence that the claim is valid. It's just a numbers game to them - their business model relies on people just giving up.
Reviewed March 29, 2025
They are the worst company I have ever dealt with!!!! They don't return phone calls. I have three new doctors to report. It's been over 90 days and they said that my case would be reviewed and final decision in 90 days. I have two letters with decision due dates and no decisions been made. I can't seem to get on the app because the app said I don't exist. I created an account. They can't find my account with my ID number, they can't find my account with my Social, app doesn't work so I can't follow any forms if there is any forms I need to file. Worst experience of my life is dealing with them. Nobody returns the phone calls.!!!!
Reviewed March 28, 2025
The worst company I have ever had to experience. Just can’t get it right. Easy straightforward requests are impossible to get done and the restrictions in place for the call center make even more difficult and a waste of everyone’s time.
Reviewed March 14, 2025
My agent, knowing that I was unfamiliar with life insurance, omitted some key information that led me to believe I could use my policy like a high-yield savings account and cash it in when I needed it (alive though). When I found out that wasn't the case, I was already out thousands of dollars in payments. I thought it strange that though I kept paying into the policy, its value did not increase. When I asked my agent about this, he replied that I should keep paying for about 10 years at which point the account would "mature" and I would see its value go up.
After a year or so, this agent was replaced with another, who told me the straight truth of the matter--that this was a life insurance policy and there is no cashing in or using it to grow wealth that you might use during your life. So yeah! Two stars because the deceitful agent got replaced with the truthful one. But the whole experience was very bitter. If I ever decide to get life insurance in the future, it will be with a different company.
Reviewed March 7, 2025
I spoke with Customer Service Advocate" Dawn". She was very patient and empathetic with my situation. Dawn is a great asset to your organization, and I'd recommend New York Life to friends and family. Thank you.
Reviewed March 7, 2025
NYL was nothing but trouble for my short term disability claim. They would hold 4-6 weeks of payment claiming it was the Dr. fault but they made excessive records requests and were very slow to pay their invoices. Anything not to pay. In the end I had to get my own records and pay to have multiple pages sent via fax
Reviewed Feb. 25, 2025
My wife literally had a baby 3 hours ago and I received a call from someone at NY Life demanding to talk to her and scolding me for not recognizing how serious it is for them to immediately speak with her. This is completely unacceptable behavior from anyone in the customer service industry especially when coupling that with a disability or medical leave claim. Do better.
Reviewed Feb. 12, 2025
NY Life long term care policy owners need to be aware of a sleazy way they cheat their policyholders. When a person is approved and receiving long term care benefits, they no longer pay their premium, yet they are billed anyway. NY Life uses a separate company to process claims who is most likely incentivized to keep claims and cost down. By billing people for premiums even when they are approved for benefits is a clever way to add revenue while having deniability that it was intentional.
Computers do not lie, they are programmed to do things including sending out statements, invoices and bills. If a policyholder is billed when they shouldn't be, every policyholder is being billed therefore it isn't an error for an individual but an across-the-board scheme to fraud people. How many policyholders do not know or are too frail to understand and continue to pay? Most likely thousands. Fortunately, I caught this for my mother (she never would have) and I'm alerting anyone comes to this site to beware.

Reviewed Jan. 20, 2025
My employer just switched from Prudential to NYL. We’ve only used them for two weeks and their customer service has been HORRIBLE to work with. I’m having a baby any day and no one is clear on what needs to be done for my short term disability no matter how many times I chat or call. But the worst part of the entire experience is that they openly admitted they allow their chat reps to hang up on you if you ask too many questions! On 1/17 I live chatted with Gwynda C who rudely disconnected on me. I live chatted again and was told by Kerry Y that “if there is back and forth regarding a claim, we can disconnect the chat. The supervisors are aware of that as well.” There was back and forth because she was incompetent to answer my questions, and yet you allow your chatters to do this?
I called in to ask for a supervisor, was told they have no idea who the chat supervisor is, and that I would get a call back later in the day. Surprisingly…I never got a call back. I have to continue to contact my HR at work since there is nothing else I can do to get a clear answer on how to get my short term disability payout. While Prudential did take a long time to pay out their claims, their process was clear and their customer service was 100% better. I would NEVER suggest any company use NYL for their employees.
Reviewed Jan. 3, 2025
New York Life is a horrible company, run and staffed by horrible, incompetent liars who take perverse pleasure in ruining lives. I think every single person who works there has deep psychopathic tendencies because NONE of them care or have any humanity in them at all. There is not a single claim that they feel is legit, so they just use the DENY, DELAY & DEFEND tactic to wear people down. The important thing is that since everybody who works there is a psychopath, they all sleep very well knowing the lives they’ve destroyed.
Reviewed Dec. 23, 2024
If I could, I would give NYL 0 stars. They have robbed me of nearly $5000. In the first incident, based on their representative’s advice, I deposited over $800,000 with them. When I asked for my money, they refused to pay me the interest and would not give me an explanation. The interest was approximately $3000.
The most recent incident, I was charge $1800 pre-payment penalty. When I called them before requesting the transfer, their agent didn’t inform me that the penalty would go away in 18 months. After putting in the request, I got a call from one of their agents trying to persuade me not to roll over the IRA. He informed me that I could take out $37000, now and the rest in 18 months time. I agreed to follow his advice. NYL transferred the full amount less than pre-payment penalty. When my advisor and I called them they told us that could reverse the payment but they would not return the pre-payment penalty. Needless to say, I will never invest another cent with NYL, nor will I recommend them to anyone else.
Reviewed Dec. 18, 2024
So I filed my claim back in 2023 and I told them I didn’t have short term disability due to my disability I deal with every day. She the lady said I would have to file std so I said ok. Denied so then I filed my ltd from 2023/2024. They denied me so now I have to appeal it because Avery the lady who kept calling me when I was in the hospital and when I got out of the hospital.. talking about no doctor sent in my medical records all joke on her. So what I did was call my doctor office and had three on three when my nurse told her we sent everything over and in my system Ms. ** sign for you’ll to get her medical records as well and they are getting them together. So Ms. Avery my case work didn’t say anything but ok.. then three days letter she said me asking me about a new doctor that my pcp refers me too.
They doctor did not do any testing on me and I’m in his office having these flare ups and he just looking at me and then told me I have PTSD. I look at that doctor and said by looking at me YOU SAY I HAVE PTSD BY LOOKING AT ME HAVING A FLAREUP Shaking a heart racing etc… So Ms Avery went on what this doctor say when this was my 1st appointment with this doctor. So I’m getting a lawyer because I lost my apartment and car due to my FMLA and I’m still on it…. Just got out the hospital last Thursday. It’s was 2023 no payments 2024! No payment it’s about to be 2025!! People work hard for they for these con to take money from people and out they checks.
Reviewed Dec. 5, 2024
NY Life experience was a big con job. They take so much of your money when you repeatedly say you want NO riders. Don't waste a cent with them. Liars and cheaters was my experience. Less than a quarter of my money left after 25 years.
Reviewed Nov. 11, 2024
My claim with NYL for long term disability, though time consuming, was handled in a professional and caring manner by all of the employees of this company. From my local representative to my case manager, and the NYL LTD Team leader, I felt that they were always looking for ways to help. Special thanks to Nakita, DeAnna, and Mellisa for all of their hard work! I would definitely recommend this company for all of your benefit and financial needs!
Reviewed Oct. 8, 2024
New York Life is a joke. They an excuse for everything. I filed std claim back August. Here is October still have not been paid for my claim. They called me on Aug 27 saying they have been trying to reach my doctor and not getting a response. So I get a hold of the doctor. No info received. I called back to have it resent. Make a long story They kepted telling me they didn't get the doctor's faxes so I had the doctors email it to me. I uploaded on the site. It took them until Sept 11 to tell me they denied my claim. So I sent a written letter in on 9/11th then from 9/11 to 9/20 it took them that long to send my request over to the appeal department.
If you call ask for a sup they're never available nor will they call back. Your case manager the one I had was never there and she never returned my calls. Her name was Ani, (she is horrible) then in the appeal dept I was assigned to Joseph and he is never in the office. Nor do they call back. I spoke to Gabriel on 9/27 who told me to send in the notes from my appointments but what she didn't tell me was if they have already sent your file to the appeal department to be reviewed and send in some documents days later then more days later they will pull your claim from the que. To attach what you just sent in which then starts the whole process over the 2 week process. They are dragging their feet. Horrible company to work with. So from Aug 12 until now I still have not been paid. They cause more stress and headaches.
Reviewed Sept. 30, 2024
They denied my claim because they "were missing a page" of my FMLA. Got a copy from my doctor office and all pages were scanned and faxed to NYL. SO many people have problems with this company where I work. People are getting behind on bills because their STD payments are not being made timely. Everything is a battle. I caught them in a lie now about my paperwork, thinking about contacting a government agency since it was for FMLA and they denied me even though all paperwork was sent.
Reviewed Sept. 24, 2024
They were unable to ever get my records which were easily accessible by following the command prompts from the phone directory of my doctor. Continually had to get records and fax to them as they do not use email and the upload function of their website never worked over the 3 months I was down. Absolutely zero consumer service from case manager Erin. Filing a complaint with my company. Hope to get them removed as a provider for our company. Highly recommend steering way clear of this group.
Reviewed Aug. 19, 2024
Many issues: they do not actually contact your provider. I called many days in a row to ask if they got a hold of her and never talked to the same person twice, so how do they know that the contact has actually been made? They prefer to use physical mail which means that by the time you actually get the paperwork they send, you only have maybe 1-2 days to complete it until they close out your STD/FMLA request. They send so much paperwork that you don't know what you need to complete. On top of my actual temporary mental illness, this has caused me so much stress. They do this on purpose so that you give up and they don't have to pay you.
Reviewed Aug. 1, 2024
Lies & says they don’t receive info that providers send, even w receipts they received it. Does anything to keep people from getting benefit payments. Doesn’t care if you get evicted or anything due to their constant stopping your payments. Will watch you lose everything and not be helpful at all.
Reviewed July 24, 2024
We filed for our LTD in MAY, we paid for it through our employer Target. NYL drug its feet even putting the claim into the system and has also drug its feet on the review of my husband's medical/psych disability. Now we are being evicted. We should have received our money back in June had they done what they promised back in May. Excuse after excuse and delay after delay. Don't waste your money on this product.
Reviewed July 20, 2024
If you're even lucky enough to even get your LTD benefits from this company, They will not pay you consistently every month! One month you might get it on the 17th or the next month it might be on the 23rd, 25th, 27th Who knows. It's complete roulette. The absolute worst insurance company EVER!!!! The only thing this company does well is find ways to stop paying you. I 110% believe they put all their resources into shafting claimants one way or another unfortunately.
Reviewed July 16, 2024
This is the WORST company to have insurance with. They give you the most difficult time to get your disability approved. AMANDA ** and her team is horrible at communication and following up. They called me the day my case closed to inform me that they couldn’t get in touch with my doctor to approve my case. My doctor and I have been doing everything to get my case open but they keep asking for more and more documents at the last minute. I’m now late on all of my bills, can’t afford my copay for my doctor visits, and my job is threaten to cut ties because NYlife hasn’t updated my case. I’m still waiting for my case to be approved which has been closed since 06/05/2024.
Reviewed May 30, 2024
Horrid benefit waiting period means I didn't get paid at all the one time I tried to collect. Conflicting information from customer support had me go fill out (and get denied) state benefits, suggesting I could collect from NYLGBS if I did so. This was not the case.

Reviewed May 21, 2024
Paid insurance for short term disability for over 11 loyal years through my employer and never had need for a claim until recently. Became ill and out of work for a few months due to debilitating symptoms from unknown condition. NY Life denied claim stating my records did not support functional impairment and “no documentation of what activities or tasks unable to perform”. Records clearly indicated what my impairments were and testing was still in progress in search for a diagnosis. During appeal doctor provided a letter and finally a diagnosis.
The nurse case managers picked and choose the medical evidence they wanted to use and ignored what was evident. Their practices are deceitful and geared to falsely deny your case not to pay you. I’m very disappointed in this company. I had a false sense of comfort thinking if I fell sick I could count on this insurance to help me. I suffered a major financial burden due to this. I will be canceling this useless policy.
Reviewed April 4, 2024
NY Life is literally stealing from me. I was given mistaken advice from my benefits supplier, and I applied for Disability insurance. Shortly after the application I realized that I didn't need this coverage. Per NY Life's instructions I sent in the form to cancel. I called shortly after and months before the policy even took effect and to ensure they had received my cancellation. They did. However, the policy went into effect anyway. Almost 8 months later they are still taking money from my check every week. I have called them at least a dozen times and spent hours and hours on hold. When I call, they always say that they DO see the cancellation, but don't know what is going on. They always promise to call me back, but NEVER do. Their call center must be only a few people because I get the same reps every time.
John is the supervisor and always promises to call me with updates, but NEVER does. He even tells me the exact day I will hear from him, so I wait by my phone all day and call never comes. I have to call the center and wait on hold for literally an hour each time. The worst part is I already have disability insurance, so if I needed it, I'm not sure I could even use this policy because I am insured through my employer already. They owe me refund for the past 6+ months. The most ridiculous part is I went on maternity leave, (Yes, I was on hold and dealing with this for hours the day before I gave birth and while I was postpartum.) the coverage lapsed. I called and said don't reinstate it, BUT THEY DID anyway. Like I said, they are literally stealing from me.
Reviewed April 1, 2024
I have been dealing with New York Life Long Term Care for about 8 months. My father passed in August and had diligently paid into the policy for 20 years. New York Life is interested in collecting money but they make it nearly impossible to submit claims. I have called on multiple occasions and have been told different information each time I have called. They demand one paper, then another, then say you never sent in the one they wanted. The only time I got a little movement on them is when I tracked the dates and what I was told and asked for names and to state specifically what they told me again. They are the worst people I have ever dealt with.
Reviewed March 6, 2024
I have read all these reviews about New York life and they all say the same thing. Everybody pays into the insurance but when it comes time to collect you are just an annoyance. I have been hung up redirected and bullied throughout this whole experience. My wife had a store in July instead of using short-term dis. She used her PTO but when that was exhausted she sent in a claim for shore disability in the new year. They denied her claim because they said it was an existing condition and when I asked what else I could do the agent blew me off to another department that had no idea what I was talking about. We then filed for her long-term disability because that's what they told us our notion was and directed us to do so.
After sending in countless documents and sitting on hold for hours and hours at a time we were told the information still wasn't enough. They have all her medical records. They have doctors' reports and nurses' notes. All the things you would think were enough. We are still waiting for any kind of communication. We are about to lose my wife's insurance and when that happens how is a person supposed to recover when they are counting on the very insurance needed to recover? We have exhausted what little savings we had left and can't even get food stamps. We understand that this is only supposed to be a supplement for income but when you pay into it and need to count on it at the worst point in your life then what good is the insurance in the first place?
Reviewed Feb. 7, 2024
I am disabled. I already had multiple disabling conditions for years but then I became officially too sick to work in 2020. It all became too much when I became sick with yet another disabling chronic disease and then a whole other a few years later. I first went through Reed Group for my short term disability (STD) and then was switched to long term disability (LTD) with New York Life through my employer. At the time they were Cigna. NYL bought Cigna. Which was a shame, because they were more understanding and patient.
New York Life uses multiple manipulation and gaslighting tactics to force you to give up. They want to harass and threaten you so that you are so overwhelmed you cancel your claim. Many people do cancel because they are unwell and the psychological tactics and pressure this company uses is downright deceptive and should be unlawful.
They lie and say they haven’t received paperwork from doctors when the doctor's office clearly states they have multiple times. They harass the doctors every few months to the point the staff that handles these claims becomes irritated. I don’t want my doctor’s offices being harassed. Those are the people trying to actually help me.
They pull little maneuvers like sending you an important time-limited and threatening letter that’s dated January 4th, but you don’t receive it on the online portal until January 29th and in the actual Mail until February 5th. There is no postmark on their letter envelopes (only IMB postal codes) so you can’t defend yourself and say that you weren’t given enough time to respond because they date their letters way before it’s physically sent.
You never have the same claim manager during reviews. I’ve been through so many different ones. Often when they leave voicemails, the quality is so awful you can’t understand what they are saying. It’s a strange skipping/glitching sound. Their response is “oh my headset is broken” but yet when you are physically on the phone with them, it’s all of a sudden fixed? Okay.
And good luck getting ahold of your claim manager in person. This is problematic because by not having one single claim manager, you have to constantly start over and prove and defend yourself and your disability and conditions to different people. It’s made to be that way on purpose. There is no single advocate who can get to know you and your conditions as time goes on. Someone you can continually communicate with and update and get to know. Perhaps this is a tactic used by NYL executives so that their claim managers don’t start to empathize with their clients because then they humanize us humans.
I have a doctor who refuses to do any disability paperwork. They tell their patients to contact another sort of parent company to get medical records. I have told NYL over ten times that they can’t contact that one doctor directly and that they have to contact this other place for medical records, yet they don’t do it. I fax them, call them, upload all of my medical documents online. And yet “we haven’t received medical records for Dr. *** and if we don’t receive them your claim could be terminated”.
I have sent in all the medical records, appointment summary notes, appointment dates, etc countless times for my many doctors. During this last review, my new claims manager actually said there were “too many medical records” - as if now having too many is now points against me. Yet I’m receiving letters saying they don’t have all the information needed? Okay.
They constantly want me to prove I’m disabled even though all of my multiple conditions are chronic and I have been proved as disabled by the SSA. They are consistently given a long list of disabling conditions that don’t change and many have no proven medications or treatments for. Now they are threatening to send me to their “Independent Medical Examiner” which is actually just a NURSE who is paid by the insurance company. Read that again: they are paid by NYL.
I have multiple specialists who don’t understand my other conditions because that’s not their specialty. There are no specialists out there who have experience in all medical fields such as Rheumatology, Neurology, Orthopedics, Cardiology, Urology, GI, Psychiatry, Psychology, Physical Therapy, etc. I have doctors in all of those fields. So it is absolutely and unequivocally impossible for a paid “nurse” that will be able to ever understand all of my chronic conditions, let alone understand how they impact me minute by minute, hour by hour and day by day…especially when no specialist doctor can. Not to mention all the awful side effects from the long list of medications I take for these conditions. Is the nurse a pharmacist too?
There have been many times I have been in tears when on the phone with NYL. They bring me to a point of emotional and physical exhaustion, causing anxiety, pain and panic. I have Autism, but they don’t seem to even want to count that as one of my problems/issues and Autism is a neurological disorder, not a mental health problem. It greatly impacts my ability to work and even to handle these constant medical reviews they drag me through and the pressure this company constantly puts me under.
There is no empathy. No sympathy. No advocating. They will do anything possible to push you beyond your limits when you are sick. It doesn’t matter if it’s just $300 a month, they look for any reason to stop paying you. Even this review here on Consumer Affairs could be damaging for me and cause my claim to be terminated simply because I have “written something”. But here’s the catch: it’s taken me over two hours to type this due to my Dystonia so far. But see…those details don’t matter to them. They can’t see the pain I’m in trying to type each and every word. How hard it is to uncurl my spasming arm and hand to type each letter and word as the pain spreads into my shoulder and neck. No, they just will see that I have typed something and could use it against me.
You are nothing but a number to them and they will pull all the scary tactics to push you to your limits. It’s nearly criminal. It is cruel. And I fear it will never be regulated and they will never be held liable for the psychological damage they cause people. So that’s why I have taken nearly three hours (now) out of my time to patiently write this. And I am mostly writing this so that others don’t feel less alone in their exhaustion and anxiety when it comes to dealing with New York Life. It’s not just me they do this to, they do this to everyone – as you can clearly read in these reviews from other people. They must be held accountable.
Reviewed Jan. 5, 2024
Their website is still from 1990's??? It good be more automated to save us time. Calling them takes a lot of time. Especially when there is more than one owner of the policy then one has to get on the phone with them one by one.
New York Life Company Information
- Company Name:
- New York Life
- Year Founded:
- 1845
- Address:
- 51 Madison Avenue
- City:
- New York
- State/Province:
- NY
- Postal Code:
- 10010
- Country:
- United States
- Website:
- www.newyorklife.com
