Connecticut Life & Health Study Guide

The combined exam draws from both content areas, but its most reliable Connecticut points sit in one place: what the state pays when an insurer fails. Connecticut does not follow the NAIC-model tiers that national study material teaches. It pays a flat half-million across every category — and then caps the aggregate at that same number, so the components do not stack.

CLHIGA — one number, five times over

If an admitted life or health insurer becomes insolvent, the Connecticut Life and Health Insurance Guaranty Association steps in under CGS § 38a-858 et seq., with the dollar limits at § 38a-871(e). The limits are:

• $500,000 life insurance death benefit
• $500,000 life insurance net cash surrender or withdrawal value
• $500,000 present value of annuity benefits
• $500,000 health insurance
• $500,000 healthcare center coverage
• $500,000 per payee on a structured settlement annuity

And then the ceiling: $500,000 in the aggregate for any one insured life, across all policies issued by the insolvent insurer on that life. The association’s own FAQ states it in those words.

Why this matters more than most guaranty questions

Because the national baseline is genuinely different, not merely differently worded. The NAIC model — and most study guides — teach $300,000 death benefit and $100,000 cash surrender value. Connecticut pays $500,000 for both. A candidate who memorised the model answers two questions wrong and never knows why.

Two figures escape the flat rule and are worth carrying: $5,000,000 where one owner holds multiple nongroup life policies, and $5,000,000 for corporate or business-owned life insurance and unallocated annuities.

You may not sell with it

CGS § 38a-852 prohibits using the Connecticut Insurance Guaranty Association in advertising or as an inducement to purchase insurance. A fact pattern in which a producer steadies a hesitant client by pointing out that the state fund stands behind the policy is describing a violation, not a service.

Note also the boundary the whole subject rests on: guaranty protection exists only for admitted insurers. A surplus lines placement has no guaranty backstop at all — which is exactly why Connecticut conditions surplus lines business on a diligent effort to place the risk in the admitted market first.

The free-look ladder, read whole

A life and health producer works every rung, so learn them as one object rather than four facts:

| Product | Free look | Authority | | Individual life | 10 days, void ab initio | CGS § 38a-436 | | Life or annuity being replaced | 10 days, unconditional full refund | RCSA § 38a-435-5(a)(4) | | Long-term care | 30 days | RCSA § 38a-501-11(g) | | Medicare supplement | 30 days | CGS § 38a-495a |

The bottom two rungs are where a senior-market producer actually lives, and they are triple the top two. Note as well what Connecticut does not publish: there is no general free-look period for an annuity outside a replacement transaction.