The untold truth about the FNB funeral plan

In February 2003, I took a FNB funeral plan for myself and my immediate family members. The insurance provider was Liberty Group South Africa (referred herein as ‘Liberty’). Since then, I regularly (at least once a year) receive a correspondence from Liberty to inform me of an increase to my premiums, whilst the benefit amount remains unchanged.

Recently, I received a notification from Liberty, regarding my increased premiums, effective from July 2026. They stated that if the new premium is unaffordable for me, I can opt to decrease my benefits to reduce the premium. Knowing that the cost of funerals, goods, and services increase over time rather than decrease, it is illogical to want less cover to cover something that is now more expensive. Therefore, I responded to their e-mail, asking them what would my premium be if I changed my current benefit amount (I.e., R30,000) to R40,000.

Having been their client for 23 years, with no claims to date, my expectation was that the benefit amount would readily be increased, the premium would be accordingly adjusted and increased, and a waiting period imposed for that increased amount. Instead, they responded to me stating that due to my spouse’s and my age being above 60 years old, they will not increase our benefit amount. Upon publicly challenging this unfair outcome on HelloPeter (https://www.hellopeter.com/liberty-life/reviews/predatory-and-discriminatory-practice-by-liberty-group-south-africa-an-experience-of-a-customer-of-23-years-***), Liberty reiterated that benefit increases at later ages are not supported.

I find it completely astonishing that FNB has partnered with an insurance provider with such an unjust clause in their funeral cover. Firstly, why am I, as your client, only finding out about this two decades after taking the policy? This should have been explicitly disclosed to me before I was deemed “too old”, when changes may have been allowed. Secondly, how is it acceptable that a client take a funeral cover, and the amount at inception cannot subsequently be changed? Surely a customer should be at liberty to adjust one’s policies to better suit their needs and financial circumstances at any given time. Lastly, how can the benefit value not increase with inflation, yet the premium increases each year without fail? A funeral twenty years ago would certainly not cost the same as it does today, nor what it will cost in twenty years time. Yet, Liberty expects a client’s choice of benefit amount from decades ago to still be suitable and appropriate to their needs today, and in decades from now.

Other insurance providers (E.g., OUTsurance, Old Mutual, Sanlam, Metropolitan, etc.) allow their client’s to update their coverage amounts and to adjust their policies to better suit their current financial circumstances, family structure, and to take into account inflation. FNB should be affiliated with these sort of insurer’s when offering their customer base a funeral plan. The current Liberty offering is ageist, discriminatory, predatory, exploitative, and actually penalizes longer-standing clients since inflation erodes the benefit value in the long-term. In addition, a few months back, I received communication from Liberty of unauthorized access to my client data. For these reasons, I believe that FNB needs to seriously reassess it’s funeral plan offering and it’s partnership with Liberty. If not, FNB customers need to avoid taking a FNB funeral plan, as they will fall into the trap that I have, where I’m (like a fool) paying more to receive less, whilst facing the harsh reality that I may be under-insured for a funeral (and associated costs) in the economy of today and the future.