Great-West Life Health Insurance Reviews

If there was less than one star - that's how I would rate. Be careful if your work goes through these guys. They do not care if you are ill, they don't care if you can no longer afford treatment or medication. They misuse facts, they will misinterpret doctors and specialists reports - their main goal is to save the company money. My life has been ruined by these guys - I am about to lose my home, my whole life. And now I cannot afford my medication - so what's the use? Next step: lawyer and media. Too many people at work they have done this to.

This is my first time writing a review but I feel it is necessary because of the horrible customer service and awful benefits provided by GWL. They require paper copies submitted for any expense claim over $400 and even if you provide everything they ask for, they require to jump through even more hoops and waste your time driving around the city trying to get doctors' notes to substantiate your claim. The phone number they provide is ALWAYS busy, so you can never get ahold of them. Typical insurance company that tries to get away with not reimbursing you for the expenses that your insurance is supposed to cover. I have had benefits with 3 other insurance companies and this one is by far the worst.

My experience with GWL was horrific right from day one. I wish I knew then what I know now. First of all, if they tell you something, it may or may not be the truth. Don’t trust them one bit. Keep your guard up. Protect yourself by printing out all your emails and record ALL phone conversations with them. Thankfully, I had a medical provider that gave me great advice at the start of my claim to journal and record everything as she was super frustrated and concerned how I was being treated right from the very beginning. It was not just concerns about one staff member, it was multiple and also multiple levels of management involved. GWL has admitted that my concerns are serious and have had negative consequences. I was told that after an investigation in June 2018 involving the director and regional manager that I would be provided the results of the investigation including what GWL has done to address the situation, any recommendations GWL has put forward and executed on, anything GWL has done to put in place such as policies and procedures to ensure this experience isn’t experienced by others, and answers to my questions. I did involve the ombudsman numerous times with no results. I found out the ombudsmen are paid by GWL. Despite my proof in the form of recordings, documentation and witnesses, they have yet provided me with any documentation that demonstrates they have taken this seriously by demonstrating to me that they did what they said they would do. It has been 5 months and still nothing.

GWL review: Absolute garbage customer service. I asked them questions and they continued to ignore me, giving me standard responses that would result in me throwing all my money away if that were not the correct choice of action. I clarified my questions point by point so that even a child would understand that I had more than one question and wasn't looking for a "Thank you for contacting us. Have a nice day!". And yet they still gave me the same standard response, this time shutting my customer service tag down completely as if they answered even one of my questions at all. I tried submitting an official complaint and even that was ignored. I didn't even get a reply from them at all. You'd get better service talking to a wall. At least you'd be able to lean on it for support.

This provider is tracking each health-related submitted claim three years backdated and calling and intimidating our health providers, questioning services, billable time and dates. Great-West Life is a parody and if we don’t check for reimbursement upon submitting a claim, they just find loopholes to not pay or to state that there are customary fee restrictions. Nonsense and not much else. Unfortunately, we are ill enough to require “covered” services and they are evil enough to keep questioning each service we have sought and requested reimbursement for. I guess that because we won’t back down and leave Great-West Life to forget reimbursing us for legit expenses, their tactic is to bully our health professionals and question the service we have been provided with.

The insurance company sucks so much. They make it so difficult for you to get money back for a claim. It's like they don't want you to get paid. You have to jump through so many hoops including talking to so many people (if you can get ahold of them), mailing forms/receipts and waiting many days.

They sent me a letter in the mail saying they need additional information for my claim. There was no address and they didn't indicate how I was to provide the information. I then called them and they said they would send me an email with the information. It's been 5 days yet no email!!! How does this company stay in business?

Will find any loophole to deny you, sham of a company and despicable people.

My school uses them and god are they awful. I had an eye exam and was told they would cover the cost of my frames, but that I had to pay upfront and they would reimburse me. I waited a month with no mention of this from them at all. I created an account on their painfully slow and worthless website only to find all the reimbursements were pending, due to a lack of a known address. They never even attempted to contact me for this information. The website was god awful so as I spent ages trying to navigate properly to set this information and at the same time, called them in case it failed to do so.

After a long while, I had finally submitted my address to them, both online and through on-phone support. I was told I would get my reimbursement in a couple weeks. A couple weeks later, a letter from them showed up at my place asking me for my address... Imagine my disbelief when they sent the letter to my address, asking for my address.

These guys are just around to steal your money unless you waste your time trying to keep them honest.

I have this insurance company with my employer and good grief does it ever suck. I had Greenshield with my last employer. For the last few years, Greenshield billed the pharmacy directly without making the employer pay extra. If having to submit your receipts for drugs is not annoying enough, you have to do it by mail. What a craptacular company. Their website works, apart from GroupNet. Every time you go to their website, you get the following message. I have been trying since Friday night and still see the same message. Need I say more. Site Temporarily Unavailable. We are sorry this site is only available. We are working to restore service as quickly as possible. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience. Return to Great-West Life website: Click here to return to the Great-West home page. This is the worst insurance company in all of Canada! I cannot believe I have to send prescription receipts again through Canada Post to get reimbursed (80%). They mail you the cheque and explanation entirely in French on top of that, no English anywhere. If you don't parler Francais, you will not understand most of it. The form I submitted was in English as were the receipts for meds prescribed by a doctor in Ontario. I have no idea what the letter says and short sentences in Eng are long in Fr. I would have to type it in Google translate, as they do not use email. I know this is a bilingual country, but do they seriously expect everyone to know French. Moreover, they don't even cover the prescription strength (a strength not available OTC), generic allergy medication, the same one Greenshield covered. Maybe that is why their explanation of my benefits for the receipts was in French? So unimpressed.