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Amica Life Insurance Review
By Cassidy Horton MONEY RESEARCH COLLECTIVE
If you’re shopping around for life insurance, Amica is a reputable provider that offers both term and whole life policies for individuals. You can choose from a variety of term lengths and coverage amounts. However, when compared to our picks for the best life insurance providers of 2022, Amica’s policy options fall short. What do we mean? Here’s all you need to know about the company’s life insurance coverage, credentials, customer satisfaction ratings, and more.
Table of contents
Amica life insurance overview
Amica Mutual Insurance Company was founded in 1907 and is the oldest provider of auto insurance in the U.S. Today, the company is headquartered in Lincoln, Rhode Island and offers homeowners, marine, personal excess liability, and car insurance. Amica Life Insurance, chartered in 1969, is a subsidiary of Amica Mutual Insurance that directly offers annuity and life insurance products nationwide.
Amica’s services
Amica is composed of four companies that provide Americans with various insurance options. In this section, we’ll take a closer look at the life insurance products offered by the Amica Life Insurance company.
Amica life insurance coverage
Amica offers term and whole life insurance policies. Term life can be best for those looking for affordable coverage during a specific period, while whole life offers permanent coverage along with other benefits.
Term life insurance
Amica’s term life insurance product offers more affordable premiums than its whole life policies, but you only get coverage for a specific amount of time. You can choose from a term of 10, 15, 20, 25, or 30 years, and your insurance premiums will remain level throughout your term. If you pass away during the term and under qualifying circumstances, your beneficiary will receive a death benefit.
When the term ends, you can let your policy expire or convert it into a permanent policy. However, if you opt to convert it, your costs will probably increase. Amica’s term coverage amounts range from $100,000 up to $5 million.
Whole life insurance
Whole life insurance is a type of permanent life insurance policy that features level premiums that stay in force for the rest of your life. Upon your demise, a death benefit will be paid to your chosen beneficiary or beneficiaries—as long as the circumstances of your death fall within the terms of your policy. Additionally, whole life policies offer a cash value component that builds over time.
Amica offers whole life coverage amounts from $25,000 up to $1 million along with the following three plan options:
- Whole Life 20: Buy the policy before the age of 80, pay premiums for 20 years, and keep coverage for life.
- Whole Life 65: Buy the policy before the age of 50, make premium payments until the age of 65, and keep coverage for life.
- Whole 100: Buy the policy before the age of 80 and pay premiums until you turn 100.
Riders
All Amica life insurance policies include a terminal illness rider. As a result, if you’re diagnosed with a terminal illness and are given a life expectancy of 12 months or less, you can receive a portion of your death benefit at that time.
What it doesn’t offer
Amica doesn’t offer life insurance types beyond whole and term, which means options such as universal life insurance, variable life insurance, final expense coverage, and guaranteed issue policies aren’t available. Additionally, the company doesn’t mention any add-on riders except the terminal illness advanced death benefit.
Amica life insurance cost
The cost of life insurance with Amica varies depending on a variety of factors such as the policy type you choose, the amount of coverage you need, your age, your health, your lifestyle choices, and more. Here are term policy quotes for a few different scenarios.
Term coverage for a 35-year-old healthy male and female
| Policy | Coverage amounts | Cost Quote Male (per month) | Cost Quote Female (per month) |
| 10-year term | $100,000 | $11.63 | $10.27 |
| 20-year term | $100,000 | $15.11 | $13.67 |
| 30-year term | $100,000 | $21.06 | $18.00 |
| 10-year term | $1,000,000 | $47.97 | $39.48 |
| 20-year term | $1,000,000 | $75.99 | $60.70 |
| 30-year term | $1,000,000 | $131.17 | $104.00 |
| 10-year term | $5,000,000 | $214.37 | $171.92 |
| 20-year term | $5,000,000 | $354.46 | $278.05 |
| 30-year term | $5,000,000 | $630.38 | $494.54 |
Assumptions: Based on a 35-year-old healthy male and female with no medical problems and no drug use.
Term coverage for a 55-year-old healthy male and female
| Policy | Coverage amounts | Cost Quote Male (per month) | Cost Quote Female (per month) |
| 10-year term | $100,000 | $42.37 | $31.58 |
| 20-year term | $100,000 | $69.70 | $50.35 |
| 30-year term | $100,000 | $93.98 | $66.56 |
| 10-year term | $1,000,000 | $306.91 | $215.22 |
| 20-year term | $1,000,000 | $561.61 | $372.29 |
| 30-year term | $1,000,000 | $791.69 | $531.05 |
| 10-year term | $5,000,000 | $1,509.10 | $1,050.64 |
| 20-year term | $5,000,000 | $2,782.60 | $1,835,96 |
| 30-year term | $5,000,000 | $3,932.99 | $2,629.78 |
Assumptions: Based on a 55-year-old healthy male and female with no medical problems and no drug use.
Unfortunately, quotes on whole life policies were not available on the Amica website. But you can get a quick quote on a term policy that’s customized to your situation. Keep in mind, your pricing may hinge on a medical exam. Amica reserves the right to require a medical exam, but it can be waived if you meet specific underwriting criteria.
Insurance discounts
Amica offers a 15% discount when you combine your life insurance policy with a home, auto, or umbrella policy. No other discounts were mentioned for life insurance policies.
Amica’s credentials
Amica is a legitimate insurance provider of life insurance in the US.
Licenses and registrations
Amica Life Insurance Company is registered with the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) and has been issued company code 72222. According to the NAIC, the company is licensed to offer life insurance in all 50 U.S. states. However, on Amica’s website, the company states that it does business in all states except Hawaii.
Awards and certifications
AM Best has given Amica Life Insurance Company a financial strength rating of A+ (Superior), which means AM Best believes Amica has a superior ability to meet its financial obligations.
Regulatory or legal actions
Like most other insurers, Amica has faced some legal battles over the years, often regarding the fine print of its life insurance policies.
For example, in the Amica Life Insurance vs Wertz case, a policyholder in Colorado committed suicide 14 months after getting a policy. The policy had a two-year exclusion for suicide so the death benefit was denied. However, a Colorado statute nullifies suicide exclusions that last longer than 12 months. In response, Amica brought the issue to the court to get a declaratory judgment confirming that it did the right thing by denying the death benefit payment. The court ended up confirming that Amica properly denied the death benefit payment.
In another case, Amica Life Insurance vs. Barbor, Amica again sought a declaratory judgment that justified its decision to decline a death benefit. In this case, proof of the policyholder’s birthdate was uncovered during the investigation process and showed she wasn’t qualified to get coverage when she did. However, the beneficiaries claimed that the birthdate record was inaccurate and moved to correct it. The court ended up deciding that Amica should pay out the death benefit to the beneficiaries.
Neither one of these lawsuits reflect adversely upon Amica’s customer service, financial integrity, or compliance with the terms of its policies.
Amica’s accessibility
Who can get Amica’s life insurance policies and what’s the process like?
Availability
Amica offers life insurance policies in all U.S. states except Hawaii. It also provides help online and in-person through its network of brick-and-mortar locations.
Contact information
Amica offers a live chat option on its website and has dedicated channels for sales, customer service, and claims.
- The sales and customer service live chat is available on weekdays from 6 a.m. to midnight ET and weekends from 7 a.m. to midnight ET.
- The claims live chat is available on weekdays from 8 a.m. to 9 p.m. ET and on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. ET.
You can also contact Amica’s customer service or sales department by calling their phone number, 800-619-6077.
- Customer service is open on weekdays from 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. ET and weekends from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. ET.
- Sales is open three hours later Monday through Thursday and one hour later on Fridays.
- The life insurance claims phone number is 800-234-5433 and it’s open on weekdays from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. ET.
Additionally, you can fill out an online contact form on Amica’s website or visit an Amica insurance agent in person at one of the company’s physical office locations.
User experience
Amica’s website makes it pretty easy to learn about its life insurance coverage options. The company lists all of its insurance products by category and then has a page for both term and whole life policies. You can find a decent amount of detail about each coverage type. Additionally, if you’d like to estimate the costs of a term policy, you can get a quote online.
Limitations
While Amica has physical offices, there may not be one near you. Additionally, the live chat option is helpful but doesn’t offer 24/7 support. We also had difficulty learning all we wanted to know about the company’s life insurance coverage online. For example, the term policy page doesn’t disclose the available coverage amounts. Further, neither life insurance product page mentions any riders beyond the terminal illness advanced death benefit.
Amica’s customer satisfaction
Next, let’s look at how Amica fares in terms of customer service.
Customer complaints
According to the NAIC complaint index, Amica had fewer complaints than were expected for a company of its size in 2021. Its NAIC complaint index was 0.53, which means it had about half the volume of complaints that were expected in the market.
In looking at the complaints filed with the Better Business Bureau (BBB), Amica had 105 complaints closed in the last three years, 42 of which were closed in the last year. However, the BBB includes complaints for all of Amica’s insurance products, so these don’t specifically reflect the satisfaction of life insurance customers.
Third-party ratings
Amica wasn’t mentioned in the JD Power and Associates individual life insurance study, which provides customer satisfaction ratings for the top-ranking insurers. However, the company at large earned an average rating of 4.5 out of 5 stars after 1,761 TrustPilot customer reviews. Additionally, it has a 1.32-star rating with the BBB after 41 reviews. While the BBB rating is low, BBB reviews often skew negative as the site is primarily used as a place to file public complaints against businesses.
Amica vs. the competition
To give Amica’s life insurance offerings a bit of context, here’s a look at how they stack up against the offerings of Transamerica and AIG.
| Amica | Transamerica | AIG | |
| Policy types | Term and whole | Term, whole, final expense, index universal | Term, index universal, final expense |
| Riders | Terminal Illness ADB | Chronic, critical, and terminal illness riders, disability waiver, income protection, AD&D, children’s benefit, term insurance rider, and guaranteed insurability rider | Child rider, waiver of premium, accidental death benefit, terminal illness ADB, nursing home confinement ADB |
| Terms offered | 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 | 10, 15, 20, 25, 30 | 10-35 (18 terms) |
| Death benefits | $25k to $5 million | $1,000 up to $10 million+ | $5,000 up to $1 million |
| AM Best Rating | A+ (Superior) | A (Excellent) | A (Excellent) |
Both Transamerica and AIG offer final expense and index universal policies while Amica doesn’t. Additionally, the other insurers both list many more riders on their policy description pages.
Because some of Amica’s competitors offer final expense coverage, their coverage amounts start at a much lower level than Amica’s. However, Amica is competitive when it comes to its maximum coverage amount of $5 million. Amica also takes the lead when it comes to financial strength, earning an A+ from AM Best where the other two only earned an A.
Amica life insurance FAQs
If you still have questions about Amica life insurance, you may find the answers here.
Methodology: How we evaluated Amica life insurance
To evaluate Amica’s life insurance offerings, we evaluated the following five factors.
- Life insurance products: We researched the types of life insurance policies and riders Amica offers, along with the company’s terms and coverage amounts.
- Credentials: We looked into the company’s registrations and licenses, awards, and lawsuits it’s been involved with.
- Accessibility: We researched Amica’s customer support channels, physical locations, service area, how easy it is to get coverage, and the user experience online.
- Customer complaints: We researched customer complaints with the BBB and NAIC, as well as customer reviews on TrustPilot and the BBB.
- Competition: We compared the life insurance policy types, endorsements, terms, death benefits, and AM Best ratings of Amica, Transamerica, and AIG.
Together, all of this information helped to give us a comprehensive view of the company’s life insurance offering.
Summary of Miami Herald’s Amica review
- Amica offers individual term and whole life insurance policies.
- You can choose from a range of term options and coverage amounts.
- The insurer’s life insurance policy and rider options appear to be limited.
- Amica fares well with third parties for its financial strength and customer satisfaction.
- The company is licensed to offer life insurance in all 50 states, according to the NAIC.
- It has fewer complaints than are expected in the market, according to the NAIC.
- Amica’s coverage options are limited. If you’d like to keep shopping around, check out our top picks for the best life insurance providers!
Cassidy Horton is a finance writer based in Seattle, Washington. With an MBA and a bachelor's in public relations, her work has been published over a thousand times by The Balance, Finder.com, Money Under 30, Clever Girl Finance, and many more. Cassidy is a self-confessed money nerd who’s passionate about helping people find financial freedom. Oh, and she really loves cats.