타인을 위한 생명보험계약자의 채권자에 대한 보험수익자의 보호

A Study on the Legal Protection of the Third Party Beneficiary in Life Insurance

As commercial industries and transportation systems became highly developed in today’ s society, effectiveness of an insurance system that eliminates unpredictable risks and seeks stability in economic life is crucial, especially when the realm of necessity for such insurance protections are increasing. Insurance is defined, economically, as a system of cooperative reservation that accords with a reasonable plan to balance between premiums and payments on large number of economic entities with shared risks, according to algebraic probability calculations, and legally, as a legal form that realizes the purposes of insurance through an insurance contract, and performs security functions of the society, by providing financial security for a loss. Among life insurance policies, a third party beneficiary policy, which designates a third party as the beneficiary, is generally executed to provide security for certain relatives of the policy holder; and in order to comply with the purposes of third party beneficiary policy, it is necessary to secure legal protection of the beneficiary. However, there are several problems under the current law. First, the policy holder is free to exercise his/her rights under the policy, without any interference from the designated beneficiary. Commecial Code Section 733 allows the policy holder to change the beneficiary and designate another third party during the policy period. In such a case, the original beneficiary loses his interests (future right to request payment) under the policy. Furthermore, the policy holder is also free to seek loans with the policy as security (The Life Insurance Standards Policy Section 21) under the policy, which makes security functions of insurance difficult, since it restricts payment to the beneficiary if a policy triggering event occurs with the policy holder’s debt being outstanding. Second, a creditor of the policy holder may intervene with the policy against the beneficiary interests under the policy during the policy term. A creditor may take measures to preserve his credit by exercising legal rights that may supercede various rights of the policy holder, such as “Obligee’s Right of Revocation” (Civil Code Section 406), “Obligee’s Right of Subrogation to Obligor” (Civil Code Section 404), or as a means of enforcement procedure, an attachment or seizure process which may be filed against the policy payment. Furthermore, the beneficiary’ s interests may still be insecure even after the policy triggering event has occurred. A creditor may exercise “Obligee’s Right of Revocation” upon fulfilling necessary requirements, and in case of bankruptcy of the policy holder, “the right to disclaim” under bankruptcy law may also be exercised. Therefore, because the intent of the policy holder in providing financial stability to the beneficiary, through the means of insurance policy, may not be realized under the contemporary law, it is necessary to devise necessary interpretations and minimal legislations for each case to protect the beneficiary’s interests.