Pros Explained

• Offers no-medical-exam policies: Texas Life offers group life insurance without a medical exam. The amount of no-medical-exam coverage you are eligible for is based on personal factors, like health history and work status.
• Few customer complaints for its size: Texas Life has fewer customer complaints than expected for its size or for a company of any size for that matter. They had zero complaints in 2021 and only one complaint in each of 2020 and 2019. This indicates that policyholders are satisfied with the customer experience.

Cons Explained

• Does not offer individual life insurance policies: Texas Life only sells group life insurance. Unless your employer offers voluntary coverage through Texas Life, you can’t purchase a policy. 
• Few policy types available: Texas Life only offers permanent universal life policies. If you are looking for a popular product like group term life insurance, you’ll have to look elsewhere.

Complaint Index

Texas Life has fewer customer complaints than expected for its size, based on data compiled by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC). The NAIC calculates a complaint index for each insurance company which measures the number of customer complaints an insurer receives in relation to its size.

Insurance companies with an expected number of complaints for their size have an index of 1.00. Companies with more complaints than expected have an index above 1.00, and companies with fewer complaints than expected have an index below 1.00. The lower a company’s complaint index is, the fewer complaints it receives from customers.

Texas Life’s complaint index averaged over 2021, 2020, and 2019 is a tiny 0.09, which means it has far fewer complaints than expected for its size. The company only had two complaints total over these three years. It appears that the company excels in customer service and claims handling.

In comparison, many of the best life insurance companies we reviewed also have complaint indexes below 1.00. 

Third-Party Ratings

AM Best gives Texas Life an A+ (Superior) rating, which means it has superior financial strength and is highly likely to have sufficient funds to pay claims. 

AM Best is a rating agency that evaluates the financial stability of insurance companies using criteria such as balance sheet strength, operating performance, and total debt. The agency uses a scale of 13 ratings to score companies based on their financial strength, with A++ (Superior) being the highest letter grade. There are also four non-rating designations. While financial strength ratings do not always reflect an insurer’s true financial condition, it is an important factor to consider when assessing an insurer’s ability to deliver on a long-term promise, like a life insurance agreement. For reference, most of the 90 life insurance providers we reviewed have a minimum AM Best rating of A.

Policies Available 

Texas Life Life Insurance only offers one type of permanent life insurance policy. Don't expect to have several policy choices if they are your employer's benefit provider.

Universal Life Insurance

Texas Life Insurance Company's sole policy offering is a form of Universal life (UL) insurance that gives permanent coverage through age 121. However, their PureLife-PLUS policy is not your typical universal life policy. Universal life tends to offer adjustable premiums and death benefits as well as strong emphasis on building up the policy's cash value component. This policy differs in that it minimizes the building of cash value in order to have a greater death benefit and more affordable premiums. It also doesn't offer the same flexibility with premiums and the death benefit amount. Instead, it offers guaranteed level premiums up to a certain age depending on what age the policy was issued at. After that, the company may adjust the premiums up or down. The policy also has a partial return of premium feature if certain conditions are met.

Available Riders

Life insurance riders are optional extensions of coverage. Some life insurance riders can be added to your policy for no charge, while others carry a fee. Here are some of the riders available from Texas Life.

Waiver of Premium Rider

If you become totally disabled and are unable to work for the required length of time, a waiver of premium rider will temporarily waive your life insurance premium without impacting your coverage. 

Accidental Death Benefit Rider

If you pass away and your death is caused by a covered accident, an accidental death benefit rider will provide a secondary death benefit to your beneficiary on top of your base policy’s death benefit. In the case of Texas Life Insurance Company, the additional death benefit is equal to the policy's death benefit so your beneficiary would receive double the policy's death benefit.

Terminal Illness Rider

A terminal illness rider is an accelerated death benefit (ADB) rider. If you get diagnosed with a terminal illness with a life expectancy less than 12 months, this rider allows you to withdraw up to 92% of the death benefit while you are still living. 

Customer Service

To reach Texas Life, you can call the company’s main toll-free phone number at (800) 283-9233. You can also request customer service in Spanish by dialing ext. 6892. Texas Life’s call center hours are Monday through Friday from 8:15 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. CT. To contact the company via email, you can fill out the online email form. 

Our Methodology: How We Review Life Insurance Carriers

We designed a comprehensive ranking methodology based on consumer priorities and life insurance company fundamentals to rank more than 90 insurers across five general categories: financial stability, customer satisfaction, product and feature variety, the overall buying experience, and cost. In order to do this, we collected over 5,000 data points and scored each company based on 55 metrics. We grouped metrics by category to see how insurers performed in each; we then weighted category scores to determine how companies performed overall.

To learn more, read our full Life Insurance Methodology.