‘My insurer is denying me £327k because it says my disability doesn’t stop me doing housework’
Katie Morley Investigates: our reader was told injuries she sustained during childbirth do not meet the criteria Katie Morley Consumer Champion
21 November 2025 12:39pm GMT
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Dear Katie,
I have two children, born in 1993 and 1995. Both of their births were traumatic, resulting in painful injuries to me. My second baby weighed 10lb and I was left with 4th-degree tears. But I was left to heal naturally, rather than being operated on to fix the issue.
I was diagnosed with irritable bowel syndrome afterwards as I was suffering from debilitating faecal incontinence, which I’ve struggled with ever since.
In 2001 I took out critical illness and life insurance with Skandia, and the policy has been taken over many times, and now sits with ReAssure, which is owned by Phoenix Life.
I’ve been paying premiums on the policy for 24 years, which increase steadily. I’m currently paying £247.21 a month while being unable to work because my faecal incontinence has, over time, become so bad.
I’ve recently had some more extensive medical investigations and it’s now thought by doctors that my bowel problems are not down to IBS at all. In fact, they are apparently a result of the extensive muscular tearing that I endured during childbirth. I feel devastated that this wasn’t fixed at the time, leaving me with this lifelong, debilitating, and deeply embarrassing problem.
The ReAssure insurance policy covers me for disability and is worth £327,000, so I tried to make a claim as I really need the money. However, it has been denied on the technical basis that my occupation was recorded as “housewife” in 2001.
ReAssure has assessed my situation and doesn’t agree that my faecal incontinence prevents me from doing my duties as a housewife. However this completely ignores the fact that I did return to work since I took the policy out, running my own business as a PR consultant for many years, before I became unable to work more recently.
So I have been paying into this policy, which was completely unsuitable, for 24 years. In that time I have received no requests for clarification of my job role or any other details.
I took my case to the Financial Ombudsman Service and it agreed with ReAssure that it was right to deny my claim, again saying that my disability did not prevent me from doing my housewife duties. It awarded me £100 for distress as I had received a misleading call from ReAssure in which I was told I should get a payout, which is just peanuts.
Not only do I feel that this policy I’ve paid so much money into is completely useless, but I also believe I’ve been discriminated against as a woman who chose to stay at home and look after children while they were small. This kind of sexism is downright unacceptable in this day and age.
– CH, via email
Dear CH,
Firstly, I was so sorry to hear about the faecal incontinence you have been experiencing, which it must have taken some courage to write to me about.
All these years after you gave birth, you say you have now been advised that your bowel issues are the result of improper care after your traumatic deliveries. It is a sad and maddening truth that the physical recovery of mothers who’ve just given birth has been systematically neglected for decades.
Depressingly, even today the situation shows little sign of improving.
Whereas for many years you were able to work, finding career success as a PR consultant, you say your condition has now deteriorated to the point where it has become impossible to continuing working.
While chatting on the phone you opened up to me about “having an accident” while out shopping at your local supermarket, leading to you having to abandon your trolley and come home. This sort of thing is not uncommon for you, you say, meaning the idea of hosting client meetings or travelling for work would feel incredibly daunting and risky. I completely appreciate why you feel this way.
Feeling less able to work has caused you to fall into financial hardship in recent years, and you’ve been trying to claim on this ReAssure policy, which covers disability. You sent me reams of correspondence from ReAssure and the Financial Ombudsman, which as you say, appears to decline the claim on the basis that after assessing your disability, it is not deemed to be bad enough to “prevent you performing your role as a housewife”.
Quite understandably, you feel outraged at the implication that you are being denied the £327,000 payout because the policy recognises you as “just” a housewife, instead of someone who earns money by doing a job outside the home. The letters you have been sent by ReAssure and the ombudsman can be read as confirming your suspicions that they are being sexist. I would be the first person to call this out if it was the case.
But when I approached Phoenix Group to ask for more detail about why your claim was not being paid, I discovered that – despite the misleading wording of the letters you had been sent – the claim was not denied for the reason you thought.
Your terms and conditions state that the policy will pay out when someone becomes “totally and permanently disabled”, meaning the “permanent total inability of the life assured to perform three or more activities of daily work”. These vary between professions, but the ones given for a housewife (amongst nearly 200 other professions), are bending, climbing stairs, communicating, general health, lifting, using your hands and fingers with precision, and reading.
As you are still able to carry all of these out, you do not meet the insurer’s definition of someone who is totally and permanently disabled, it said. Unfortunately your claim to receive personal independence payments from the Government in respect of your faecal incontinence were also declined, since you were also deemed by its own criteria to be fit to work.
I know being told this must feel incredibly frustrating for you, but unfortunately when it comes to insurers, they are only obliged to deliver what is set out in their terms and conditions. However, if those terms and conditions were unfair in the first place then that would give you more grounds for further review.
It seemed strange – and flawed – to me that you were still listed on the policy as a housewife after more than 20 years, even though you had not been one for most of the policy’s duration.
Then it emerged that even if you had tried to change your listed occupation (which you had not done), you would not have been allowed to. I told Phoenix this seemed like a design flaw with the policy. I asked it to review whether, had your occupation been listed as “PR consultant”, you would have qualified for a disability payout, but I’m afraid the answer remained the same: “No”.
In addition, it said it had sent you regular reminders urging you to review the details of your policy to check it was still suitable for you, which you didn’t do.
The policy had been arranged for you by your ex-husband, who ran a financial advice firm, but who has since died. Since 2001 some £48,000 has been paid into the policy, most of which has come out of your own pocket. You feel this makes it hard to cancel, but as things are, this policy is not going to pay out on the basis of disability. If you want to pursue Reassure for mis-selling by your late ex-husband’s company then you could seek redress from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme.
However, if the evidence points to you being left to suffer as a result of clear medical negligence, then you might be better off pursuing a legal claim against the hospital, although it’d be beyond the scope of my work to assist you with this.
If you’re still willing to pay for life and critical illness cover then I think you need to look at some more modern policies which have more comprehensive terms and conditions and could offer you better value for money.
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I want you to know I truly sympathise with your situation, and strongly feel women like you who’re expected to smile and carry on despite dreadful physical symptoms following improper care after childbirth deserve so much better.
I wish you the very best of luck.
A Phoenix Group spokesman said: “Ms H’s original policy was arranged in 2001 by her financial adviser. ReAssure was not involved in any stage of the sale or advice process for the policy she was sold. It is the responsibility of the policy holder or their IFA to ensure that the terms and conditions of the policy match their requirements and to review their cover periodically.
“Both Reassure and the Financial Ombudsman Service are content that the policy was administered fairly and in accordance with its terms and conditions and while we sympathise with Ms H’s condition, we will not be paying compensation to her nor refunding her the costs she has incurred in paying for the policy while it has been in force.”
View this Telegraph (UK) article CLICK HERE
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