Brenda Brenda:
[There was no Dutch insurance that would cover us when we just moved here either, we would have to take out a Canadian.
But, I wasn't sent by my employer, and not as a diplomat actually working for my country.
I wonder how BP or Shell does that with their expats?
I've been told I'm not 100% correct about what DFAIT would (at the time)do. Apparently they had some policy in place which said if your insurance would not pay out that the government "would consider" covering the price of the pay out. The fact it was not a rule but a consideration is still lame IMO however.
There are international insurers. We used Clements for car insurance once but it was kind of sketchy and I never felt comfortable that they would cover us. I was ready for an exercise in pulling teeth if I ever had a claim. Their life insurance would have cost us over 3.5 times what we pay here and when you look into things it would be about 3.5 times harder to get a pay out from them. In short we don't know anyone from any countries diplomatic corps who used them for life insurance.
I'm betting private companies like you mention cover their employees better. It would not surprise me. Being that this type of thing does not happen often with our Diplomats, and the coverage it is getting I'm hoping the government does the right thing and helps the spouse out in some way.