Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company Northwest Mutual insurance, Life Insurance, insurance scam, financial services rip off, whole life, universal life, Internet

When my husband was diagnosed with cancer and we knew he was terminal, one of the things on his bucket list was to take the grandkids to Disney World.  We had not met them before and this would have been the first time we saw them because my son had moved to Colorado from Florida.  We didn't have the funds for this type of trip, so I cashed in my life insurance policy for what it was worth: $10,000. They did not ask me a thousand questions, the rep said it was my money to with what I wanted.  We got my son's family to Disney and were on our way from Key West to Orlando to meet them and have a great vacation/family reunion.  My husband didn't make it.  Half way up, he went into crisis and was gone 8 days later.  My husband passed away from kidney cancer caused by cigarette smoking.  I was bedside when he passed and was a complete absolute mess.  When I called NWM to report his passing, the live person I spoke with, not a computer, was nothing but compassionate, patient and knowledgable.  They took their time with me and helped me file the final claim.  I continue to have a ploicy for my mother, and I took out a new policy on myself. I know when the time comes, this company will not play games with our benificiaries.  

 I had to jump in because of so many misinterprutations.  I have worked in financial for years, and years, and years.  Interned with NWM and they do a great job of informing their employees on all the benefits of using their products and how great they are.  The problem is they never talk about the other options that are out there and what is best for the client.  Right away they teach you that a whole life policy is the best thing ever and that they have the best one.  Half true.  I think they do have one of the best out there but they only make sense for a small chunk of people.  Problem is they recommend it to everyone!  The interest is not fixed and is based off of the performance of the company.  In that aspect all your doing in a while life policy is buying NWM stock and collecting the everchanging dividend without growth of the asset itself.  Then you take insurance fees out, which they will never discuss but are necessary.  So at the end of the day take out maybe .5% if your young and 2% if your old from your cash value every year so your really earning some fraction of that dividend.  Now take your "Loan" out from the cash and pay an interest rate on the loan taken from the remaining cash value.  Again depleting your savings.

From what I have seen you would have been better off buying a tax free bond, or bond fund, or just investing regularly if the goal is to save money.  Use Insurance companies for insurance, banks for banking, accountants for taxes, and investment firms for investments.  Use common sense.  Would you let an oncologist do neurosurgery, or your kidney specialist repair your spine?  No. 

Are you serious? You know NOTHING about insurance so you're throwing Northwestern under the bus. In ALL sales situations, it's about who do you know? Sale at an insurance company and this one is Northwestern. Start with family and friends, see if there is a need, if none, move onto the next one. YOU failed at Northwestern, many people do. You're not cut-out for sales. Take a salaried postion. Earn $50,000/yr and struggle to pay your bills for the rest of your life. Or grow up and learn how to sell something 

I read this report simply because in the late 80's I was in NML's college agent program.

The ignorance of this claim against NML was so vast as to be exhausting. It is a Saturday night and I would much rather be relaxing. Instead, there is this monumentally sad attempt to harm a good company. Doing a little reading between the lines here, I can make a few guesses.

One, I doubt you listened to the training. If you did, you did not understand it nor care for the discipline involved in being a saver or an agent.

Two, you probably found it difficult to make money. Even if the commissions are what they were then you probably did not make money. The tone of the complaint makes it hard for me to imagine that you had the ear of too many people on matters as important as how to save money long term, provide needed death benefits, or even why savings and investments are completely different animals.

I have not worked for Northwestern Mutual for decades but the business lessons and experiences I gained as an intern are invaluable to me even today at this late date. I know of five companies I would trust to put my permanent life insurance needs and Northwestern Mutual and its practices are designed to protect policy holders within the paramenters of providing maximum benefits with maximum dividend performance. That is a complex set of responsibilities.

Northwest Mutual has my continued respect as do their training programs that I went through.

Tim S.

I read you scathing review about NM and thought to myself, what a snivily nosed putz.  NM's internship program is one of the best of its kind.  Of the best reps in the company 60% were college interns that went on to success as a financial advisor with NM.  Truly huge opportunity.  Calling on friends and family is a place to start any sales position.  Depending on the manager that is mentoring the intern, would depend on the approach style and subsequently the pressure to buy. 

Regarding the products, it is quite obvious that the person I am replying to has no real concept or understanding of how the products actually work.  Just an education provided by an anti whole life stock broker who will always bash any cash value product as being bad.  This is just not true, especially in the case of NM.  Their cash values are 25% better than the next closest competitor over the pats 20 years.  I am sure the individual who wrote this report went on to a salaried position earning less than $50,000 per year with very little growth potential. No wonder he is bitter. 

After filing my initial report, I discovered that I had misinterpreted the Northwest Mutual statement saying that they had deducted $5000 from my account.  In reality, the statement, which is unclear, says that the account that replaced my money-market account has a penalty for early withdrawal that decreases with time.  The $5K figure is for early withdrawal and is wholly theoretical (I don't intend to withdraw from the account early).  My apologies for the confusion; for the most part, I am very satisfied with my experience with Northwest Mutual.

My wife and I went to Northwest Mutual several years ago to look into long-term care insurance.  Long story short, the representative discovered that we weren't satisfied with the performance of our retirement investments and, over several months, talked us into several things that I now regret.  Whenever I brought in statements with questions, this person insisted that I should simply throw out the statements and leave everything to him.  He did a great job of explaining things with PowerPoint slides and complex summaries that showed how well our account was doing.  But doubts always rose their ugly heads a night or two after a consultation.

One $120K "investment" at NWM turned out to be a money-market account that was "earning" minus-$500 per year, after all of the fees were deducted.  When I challenged the wisdom of this account, I was told that, as retirees, we needed to have conservative investments, especially in trying financial times.  After insisting that the money-market account be closed, we were told that NWM would, out of the goodness of their heart, make a one-time exception to their rules and, at my request, reinvest the funds in a more risky account (something our NWM advisor told us was almost unheard of). 

Since the money was going from one NWM account into another, I assumed the change would be free or that any charges would be nominal.  Our next statement, however, showed a "withdrawal charge" of more than $5000.  We were neither informed orally nor in writing that such a charge would occur.  I'm sure a withdrawal charge is stated somewhere in the mountains of fine print we received from the company, but I haven't found it yet. 

My wife and I don't claim to be well prepared to understand the complexities of modern financial products.  However, we do expect that our money will be skillfully invested by the professionals of a major financial institution.  Northwest Mutual claims to be a Financial Services and Wealth Management company (it's on their letterhead).  I assumed we could trust them to look out for our interests while making a fair return on the money they invest.  But this example (and others that are too complex to explain here) suggest otherwise.  If you're in the same boat, be sure you ask lots of questions and read everything before signing on the dotted line.  I'm very serious about that--don't sign anything until you fully understand it and have asked lots of questions.  If you don't understand it, then you should find another company to handle your money.

Hello friends,

I must add my own perspective regarding whole term life insurance. There are many empassioned responses defending the honesty and sanctity of whole term life policies, and how great Northwest Mutual is, well to this, I say rubbish. Here is why. In some aspects, whole term life insurance may be a reasonable investment, IF you truly understand what you are getting into, and realized when your net cash value will break even, etc. However, certain representatives, eg christopher hahn( a bloated clown who was voted best financial rep for 2007, such jilted self serving awards, made by vultures for vultures) for instance, prey upon the financially ignorant , and use very aggressive , even bullshit scare tactics to get their victim to sign up. So in essence they are financial predators, case closed. Believe me , this is only my experience some 10 yrs ago, and actually, when I woke up, was lucky enough to cancel the policy at not such a significant loss. I could go on and on about unscrupulous procedural techniques, eg: isolating the victim, not talking to anyone else but you , so as to avoid more experienced questions, saying that a decision had to be made within 1 day as this was a "special offer", etc, etc....But ultimately, I would just tell the newbies out there (eg, just out of academia, greener than green), when it comes to whole life: be aware how much they are asking you to invest, really look at the ridiculous premiums paid out, compared to term insurance, realize opportunity cost of this vs immediate tax advantages of a 401k, and lastly realize how long they will have you put money into a hole, hoping some day it will pay out, with actually, only guaranteeing not even a 4% return , if that , perhaps just your principal, minus fees. Essentially be prepared that this is a long term investment, eg, dont expect to even break even until 12 years or more. If you do the math for a 25yr + policy, you will be horrified at the money you put into it, vs what you get out. Lastly, while again, in less aggressive ways, this could make sense in terms of a small policy, however, I KNOW FOR A FACT that these s**t suckers, aggressively target individuals who are just out of shool, or new to the area, with little or no experience. Lastly however, it is upto you to be strong, because ultimately, there is nobody to truly blame but yourself for being talked into something without complete understanding. 10+ years later, I am so much better off for it, that in certain regards, I should thank assholes like this for burning me, because my knowledge, savy and wisdom took off exponentially, and now I can retire if I wanted to. Burn me once, great, it is how you dust yourself off and learn from mistakes, and become all the better.

Good luck people, 

nobody and everybody who just tries to make their way

I have about 6 years of experience in the insurance/securities industry, and I truly feel sorry for anyone who does business with Northwest Mutual. Their products are horribly priced and generally outdated (6% dividends sounds great until you realize you're paying literally 2-3x as much in premium as you would be in a modern IUL), plus their sales force are a bunch of sharks and I've had multiple clients tell me about being offered rebates from NW agents if they sign up (meaning the agents offered to pay the premiums of the policy for 1-3 months, which is unethical and illegal).

Their financial ratings are sound, largely because they are robbing you on the premiums they charge. Inevitably, this will provoke NW agents to start posting responses about the dividend payouts, but the bottom line is when you do the math, their whole life policies are SCREWING YOU. You can get the same tax-deferred growth and even more competitive returns through AXA Equitable's VUL or National Life group or North American's IUL products for 60-75% of the premium contribution. Plus all of the above named companies offer Long Term Care provisions that allow clients to access death benefits in a life policy for LTC purposes.

Trust me, if a NW Mutual agent offers to "buy you lunch so he can introduce you to what he does," politely decline. Their products are a joke and they love to dangle the dividends in front of you but they're only telling a very small part of the whole story, which is that they'll rob you in the process and sell you an outdated product (Northwest mutual whole life is like buying a Nokia brick cell phone in 2013.)

Savings accounts?  Are you talking about whole life insurance cash value?  Normally there's a selection in the application process whereby the client can select whether or not he/she wants the death benefit plus the cash value for an extra cost in premium.  The insurance company figures that you want the greater of the death benefit or the cash value.  The death benefit is usually greater.  Instead of paying the insurance company, why not buy term and some perm for the insurance need.  Term, remember, pays a claim only 3% of all policies in force.  Therefore, the perm is useful to pay expenses, as it's permanent and will be there when your client dies. 

I'm an advertising sales professional & truly appreciate everything that Northwestern Mutual has done for me with respect to planning my retirement. It's been incredibly difficult to weed through all of the options that are out there when it comes to retirement. My Northwestern rep started out in the same internship program you've mentioned in your report, but had a very different experience. I'm not sure what sort of a career you plan to go into, but if you intend to go into any type of selling job, you'll need to know how to work your friends & family to your advantage. I feel that my whole life policy from Northwestern is a great "fallback investment", in addition to my 401k, Roth IRA (Which I can no longer contribute to), Social Security, and cash savings. I understand that without an extensive knowledge of finances, it would be difficult for an intern to see the value of a long-term, guaranteed investment such as a whole life insurance policy. There are several advantages to it. 1) A whole life policy grows at a guaranteed 6% interest rate. Over the term of my policy, I will pay in roughly $48,000. However, at my paid-up date, it will be worth $100k 2) I can withdraw against a whole life policy when I'm older, without paying income tax. That makes it better than a savings account, and, generally speaking, better than a 401k (tax-free when you contribute, but taxed at normal rates upon withdrawal), but slightly worse than a Roth IRA, which is taxed pre-contribution, but tax-free at withdrawal. The downside to a Roth IRA is that you can only contribute up to $5k annually, until you earn a salary of 107k or greater. Once you earn that large of a salary, your contributions are limited even further, and ultimately eliminated at an income of $122k, leaving your only true, tax-free (at distribution) retirement option to be a whole life insurance policy. Is your post suggesting that Northwestern doesn't deserve to earn a profit for helping millions of American's retire comfortably? They're currently one of the highest rated financial services firms in the country, and they do it all without public relations & branding advertising (You've surely heard of companies like Charles Schwab, TD Ameritrade, Bank of America/Merrill Lynch, Scottrade, etrade, ING Direct, etc).  The bottom line is this: You should really be investing in nearly every type of retirement investment you possibly can. You'll almost always be better off. Just imagine if the millions of folks who were deeply invested in their company's 401k had been a bit more diversified in 2008 when their retirement plans lost 30% of their value in the stock market crash! If they had even 25-30% of their investments secured in whole life insurance policies, they wouldn't have been hurt nearly as badly. A small (very small) portion of the job crunch has also been caused by the lack of retirement that's happening in the workplace as a result of these losses. See this report, from before the recession hit, which shows that fewer than half of all Americans expect to be able to retire comfortably - this was 6 months before the market crashed: (((ROR REDACTED))) and this from more recently (November 2010) which points out that Employers will have a tough time facilitating the promotion of younger employees who want to get ahead: http://jobs.aol.com/articles/2010/11/02/fewer-americans-planning-to-retire/

No, I do not work for Northwestern Mutual, nor do I work in the insurance industry, or financial services industry. But I will retire very comfortably, while you (the author of this "ripoff" report), will most likely be working until you die. Maybe that's what you want to do, but I would sure like to enjoy my retirement!

 CLICK here to see why Rip-off Report, as a matter of policy, deleted either a phone number, link or e-mail address from this Report.

I bought a whole life policy from Northwestern Mutual when I was in college 30 years ago. Since then, I have purchased an additional whole life policy and a Northwestern annuity as well. In addition to the stocks, bonds and collectibles I own, I consider my NWM policies to be very valuable assets.

If you don't think NWM whole life polices are terrific investments, then it would appear to me that you don't fully understand life insurance.

I have found NWM representives (my personal agents and customer service) to be highly trained, professional and very service oriented.

I have owned four Northwestern Mutual life insurance policies for many years and my experience with the company has been entirely positive. When I bought these insurance policies I did extensive research and ran the numbers. This company, along with New York Life and Mass Mutual, came out on top. 

To the person who is talking bad about NWM, they are so incorrect.  Every insurance company does this, but I have to say that I have friend who work for NWM and they do not push their clients at all.  He says their training is great and will always be able to use it if they do not suceed.  What I find funny is that everyone really does need life insurance, especially if you have a family.  It's not expensive and well worth it, for sure.   The savings account is used if they need to borrow from it, that is all.  It is not a bank!  This money is put aside at a low interest rate if they need to borrow it while they are alive.  ALL insurance companies have that program!!  If you purchase that type of insurance, wholie life/permn. life that is how it is with ALL companies!!  I worked for Allstate and our insurance products are the same. 

I have been in the insurance business for over 22 years. From running my own company and to selling to a larger corporation. Been on the independent side, general agent side and now part of NML. The first statement is this company in every regards puts the client first. You will find out they have their policy holders every year do their own audit of the company and their practices. Name another company allowing this today. To my knowledge their is no top 1000 company doing it. Next take their conservative stance to underwriting and you will see in their large dividend pay outs to policy holders a large portion comes from great underwriting. Now as a representative this can be frustrating when you have a president or key employee you want to insure and the company will not insure them due to medical issues. But it is in the policy holders best interest to only take risk in their best interest.  The policy holder/owners of the company do come first. Yes owners, a mutual company is owned by the policy holders. They do not have to show the big profits to share holders but only to the owners/policy holders. The company will also not tolerate representatives that due not follow their strict guide lines of professional representation. I have seen them fire a large producer for not following the rules as defined by them. Their are no exceptions to these rules. In other companies I have seen the old saying of production hides the sins. Not here if you do not keep records of your sales in a compliant manner and do what is best for the client, you will be looking for a job. 

First and foremost, Northwestern Mutual does interview a lot of candidates, especially for their internship program.  I was part of that process when I started as an intern in January 2009.  Let's look at this point first.  Northwestern has the reputation as the "Quiet Company," meaning that they don't spend a lot of their money on advertising in mass media.  While this is changing now, it is a great point for policy holders because the company is not spending its reserve funds on needless advertising.  With that point in mind, how many college students do you think have heard of Northwestern Mutual by actively seeking out insurance and investment advice or by seeing their commercials on t.v.?  I'll go out on a limb and say not a whole lot. So, for Northwestern to bring new blood into the company, they have to actively recruit competent talent.  Where to find these individuals with work ethic, smarts, and a drive to succeed? That's right, on college campuses.  So yes, they have to go out, see people, and find those with a passion to serve others.

Number two, the "hard sale" of insurance products.  The company culture of Northwestern is not to "sell" anyone.  It is to identify a need and make recommendations for that need.  During the process of helping individuals build financial security, there are many aspects a financial representative needs to cover.  These areas include: saving, investing, debt reduction, and protecting a family with insurance products.  Out of these areas, which do you think a college student could be competent enough to explain, investment products or insurance coverage?  In my opinion it is far easier to learn the basics of insurance than investment strategies, risks, and returns for savvy investors.  Not to mention that it would take much to long, and no student would even try, to obtain securities licenses for an internship.  So, we are left with interns getting a license for life insurance which is still part of a comprehensive financial plan and much easier to put into place than investments.

The third point of Northwestern keeping the cash value of a policy holder that dies is easy to rebut.  Yes, they keep the cash value.  That's right, I said that they do indeed keep the cash value.  But, that's because the surviving family receives the death benefit.  So, now it's time for an example.  Say John bought a $100,000 whole life (permanent) insurance policy 30 years ago.  Hypothetically the cash in the policy is $20,000 and the face value (death benefit) has gone up to $200,000. (Anyone with working knowledge of permanent insurance knows that cash value increases as well as the death benefit, barring any tweeks made by the policy owner that would keep these at a level amount).  John has lived a long life and passes, leaving the $200,000 death benefit to his family.  Northwestern keeps the $20,000 in cash value and premiums paid in.  If you could explain how getting 200k is better than getting the cash of 20k is better please go ahead.  Now, some would say, "Why don't they get both?"  I would say to that, how in the world would a company stay in business if it paid the death claim and all cash in the policy.  There would be no way to sustain the company if the only payment they ever got was premium.  Last, no one who uses the policy exclusively for the death benefit is concerned with the 'savings' aspect.  Younger people will like the savings aspect and can use the cash throughout their lifetime and should do so based on their specific goals.  If the 'savings' is a RIP OFF, please show me another asset that draws a 6.15% return (current Northwestern dividend), on a tax deferred basis, with no early withdrawal penalty.  IT CAN'T BE FOUND.  But to get interesting let's try.  Savings account - hahahaha, if you're lucky a 1% return - congratulations you lost out to inflation.  CD's - again 1-1.5% return, TAXED - still losing to inflation.  Bond portfolio - In this day in age still at 5-7% with junk bonds, taxed so that the real return is below 5%, and if it is inside IRAs there are early withdrawal penalties.  IRAs and 401k - great place for LONG TERM saving - they will get you the best returns with the right asset allocation, but if you want that money before you are 60 you will pay taxes and penalties.  So, you tell me what asset gives you great return, defers taxes (and has many options to use the money tax free), and is accessible to you at any time? You got it...Life Insurance through Northwestern Mutual.

Now as far as them contacting family and friends, who else would you know to contact and have such an important conversation with?  Yes, that's right, you would have rather called on executives, partners in law firms, engineers, etc. because they would have certainly taken a college student seriously.  You have to start in your natural market, let them see the value you bring, and then be referred out to other individuals.  There shouldn't be a problem talking with your family and in fact those should be the most important conversations you have.  Consider your family not having the right amount of life coverage, or none at all.  Most likely a premature death would devastate the family; be it a parent, child, or primary wage earner.  I can say from experience that 80-90% of the people I have talked with don't have adequate coverage based on what they would want to have covered if they passed prematurely.  If you didn't talk with them about life insurance, no one probably ever would; which would be a sad tragedy.  Talk with a few financial reps, financial advisors, or even friends and family members and see if you can't come up with some stories of families or individuals devastated by a lack of life coverage.  It is just as important, if not more, than the investing part.  If you can come up with someone who has never heard of or known a person affected by losing a loved one too soon then you can bash life insurance all you like.  But I will venture that you can't find someone like that.

In closing, life insurance is vital, no matter who you get it through.  But, if you are going to purchase something so important, why not go through the best company?  By best I am pointing to Northwestern Mutual, who has the strongest financial ratings across the board with a positive future outlook.  They are in fact the only insurance company with those ratings and one of only a handful of any type of company in the world with those ratings.  So it makes sense why they are so beloved even when there is misunderstood slander put out by people on sites like these.  For those that would like to rebut the ratings, feel free to look at the four large ratings firms and see where Northwestern ranks.  New York Life will claim the strongest ratings also, but they have a negative outlook, which indicates they will soon be downgraded; leaving Northwestern alone at the top.