Written by · Reviewed by Smiths Insurance & KiwiSaver — licensed Financial Advice Provider (FSP712931) · Last updated 2026-08-19

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Does Life Insurance Cover Suicide in NZ? The 13-Month Exclusion Explained

Yes, after 13 months. Every New Zealand life insurance policy wording we were able to read applies the same exclusion period, and it is 13 months rather than the 12 that most people expect. Once that period has passed, death by suicide is covered on the same terms as any other cause, and the sum insured is paid to the beneficiary or the estate.

That is the whole answer to the question most people are asking. The rest of this page sets out where the 13 months is measured from, what restarts the clock, and what a beneficiary needs to do when a coroner is involved. It is written as policy mechanics, because that is what is hard to find out at the moment somebody needs it.

Two people sitting together at a kitchen table with one folded document between them

What do New Zealand policy wordings actually say?

The same thing, in ten different sets of words. Most of them never use the word "suicide" at all.

Chubb Life's Assurance Extra wording is one of the plainest: it will not pay "if the life assured dies or becomes terminally ill as a direct or indirect result of intentional self-harm within the first 13 months" of commencement, an increase other than inflation, or reinstatement, and adds that "intentional self-harm includes suicide and attempted suicide" (Chubb Life, CIG0181 V5, retrieved 19 August 2026). AIA's is keyed to "an intentional self-inflicted act (whether sane or insane) within 13 months of the risk commencement date" (AIA, version 5 effective 10 October 2023, retrieved 19 August 2026). Fidelity Life's says it will cancel the cover "and retain any premiums paid if an insured person, whether sane or insane, dies by their own hand within 13 months" (Fidelity Life, November 2024, PP Version LCW-24B, retrieved 19 August 2026).

Insurer and document Exclusion period The clock runs from Does an increase restart it?
Partners Life, Life Cover Benefit Sheet V19.1 (22 April 2024) 13 months Commencement, or reinstatement, whichever is later Yes, on the increased portion only; inflation adjustments carved out
AIA, AIA Living Life Cover, version 5 (10 October 2023) 13 months Risk commencement, or reinstatement The wording states it "applies to any subsequent benefit increase you make" and says no more
Chubb Life, Assurance Extra, CIG0181 V5 13 months Commencement, increase, or reinstatement Yes, and "this exclusion will only apply to the increased amount"; inflation carved out
Fidelity Life, Platinum Plus, LCW-24B (November 2024) 13 months Start date, reinstatement, or increase Yes, on "the increased portion of cover"; CPI option carved out
Asteron Life, Personal Insurance, RP347 (06/17) 13 months Commencement, increase, or most recent reinstatement Yes, "for the increased portion only"
Pinnacle Life, sample Life Cover (7 October 2024) 13 months, shown as a calendar date on your schedule Policy start date Yes, "a 13-month exclusion for suicide will apply to any increase in Life Cover"
Momentum Life, Platinum Life (17 August 2023) 13 months Policy acceptance, increase, or reinstatement Yes, "but only in respect of the increase"; automatic increases carved out
OneChoice, Life Insurance (24 October 2021), underwritten by Pinnacle Life 13 months Acceptance, increase, or reinstatement after cancellation by the insurer Yes, "but only in respect of the increase"
AA Life, Life Cover (issued from 8 April 2026), underwritten by Asteron Life 13 months The date cover "starts or restarts", or an increase Yes, "for the extra amount only"
Southern Cross Life and Living, CIG0455 V1, underwritten by Chubb Life 13 months Commencement, increase other than inflation, or reinstatement Yes, "only apply to the increased amount"

Each row is taken from that insurer's own published wording, with the version code and date as printed on the document, all retrieved 19 August 2026 and linked in the references. Wordings are revised, so check the document that came with your own policy.

Two things are worth pulling out of that table. All ten set the same 13 months, which makes this one of the few genuinely standardised terms in the New Zealand market. And most of them exclude "intentional self-harm" or "an intentional self-inflicted act" rather than suicide by name, which is a broader test than the word suggests.

What happens after 13 months?

The cover pays. There is no reduced payment, no separate claim path and no further self-harm exclusion on the life benefit once the period has run. A policy taken out five years ago pays a death by suicide exactly as it pays a death by cancer or a car accident.

The exception is not the age of the policy but the age of the change to it. Because the clock restarts on increases and on reinstatements, a fifteen-year-old policy that had its sum insured raised eight months ago carries a live exclusion, but only on the raised portion at every insurer that says so explicitly. The original cover is unaffected. Automatic inflation or CPI increases are carved out of that rule at Partners Life, Chubb, Fidelity Life, Momentum and Southern Cross, because you did not apply for them.

Reinstatement is the other trigger to watch. If a policy lapsed for non-payment and was later reinstated, several wordings run the 13 months from the reinstatement date rather than the original start. Partners Life's runs from commencement or reinstatement, "whichever is the later". Asteron's runs from "the most recent reinstatement of the Life Cover".

There is one waiver worth knowing about if you have changed insurers. Chubb Life, Fidelity Life and Asteron Life all publish a replacement-cover exception: if the new policy replaced life cover that had been continuously in force for at least 13 months with another insurer, and you can prove that cover existed and was cancelled, the exclusion is not applied, up to the amount that could have been claimed under the replaced policy. If you are switching insurers, that clause is a reason to tell the new insurer about the old policy on the application.

Are premiums refunded if the exclusion applies?

Not on the evidence we could find, and this is where the common advice online is wrong.

Of the ten wordings above, nine say nothing at all about premiums in connection with this exclusion. One addresses it directly, and it goes the other way: Fidelity Life will "cancel the cover, or the increased portion of cover, and retain any premiums paid". We could not verify a premium refund provision at any New Zealand life insurer, so we are not publishing one.

Funeral insurance is a separate mechanism and should not be read across. Momentum Life's funeral policy contains no suicide clause at all. Instead it pays only accidental death for the first 24 months, and states that if the life insured dies within those 24 months from any cause other than accidental death, "we will refund all premiums paid to us for that Life Insured since the Cover Start Date" (Momentum Life Funeral Insurance policy wording, issue date 17 August 2023, retrieved 19 August 2026). OneChoice's funeral policy uses a 12-month version of the same accidental-death limitation. That is a different structure, and the refund attaches to it, not to a suicide clause.

Does the 13 months apply to trauma, TPD and income cover?

No, and the reason matters. On those benefits the self-harm exclusion has no time limit at all. It is permanent.

Fidelity Life's trauma wording states you "can't claim under this cover in connection with an intentional self-inflicted act or injury", with no period attached, and its TPD and income protection wordings say the same. AIA's critical conditions, TPD and income protection appendices exclude claims where "the life assured deliberately injures himself or herself or attempts to do so". Chubb, Asteron, AA Life, Pinnacle and OneChoice all carry equivalent permanent exclusions on their living benefits.

So the 13-month rule is specific to the death benefit. On every other benefit type, self-inflicted injury is outside the cover for as long as the policy exists. Pinnacle Life's income protection goes further than most and excludes mental illness outright, which is worth checking against your own wording. Our guide to insurance and mental health in NZ covers how that affects an application.

Is the exclusion required by New Zealand law?

No. It is a contractual term, and nothing more.

We checked the Life Insurance Act 1908 (1908 No 105), the Insurance Law Reform Acts of 1977 and 1985, and the Contracts of Insurance Act 2024. None of them mentions suicide. Nor does the Law Commission's 248-page review of the 1908 Act, which recommended its repeal (Law Commission Report 87, Life Insurance, November 2004, retrieved 19 August 2026). The Contracts of Insurance Act 2024 received the Royal assent on 15 November 2024 and is not yet in force (section 2, retrieved 19 August 2026). It does not address suicide clauses either, so the biggest overhaul of New Zealand insurance contract law in over a century will not change this.

That silence is why the details differ. No statute sets the period, so each insurer sets it, and each decides for itself whether the clock restarts on an increase, whether inflation increases count, and whether the exclusion touches the whole sum insured or only the new part.

What a beneficiary needs to know

Three practical things, none of which is obvious at the time.

The first is documentation. Insurers ask for a certified death certificate, certified identification, and, above a threshold, probate or letters of administration. Fidelity Life and AIA both set that threshold at $15,000. Asteron Life sets it at $40,000 for a life claim. Fidelity Life notes that "probate and letters of administration can take several months to be issued", and that an advance payment may be available for immediate costs such as a funeral while the paperwork is completed (Fidelity Life claims guide, retrieved 19 August 2026).

The second is the coroner. Where a death is unexplained, violent or suspicious there has to be a coronial inquiry, and a final death certificate is only issued once the coroner has completed their findings. The Coroners Court is candid about the timeframe: an inquiry "can take months, and often several years, to complete". It also names the workaround directly: "Most agencies, such as banks, insurance companies, ACC and Work and Income, will need a final death certificate before they can process any applications you make to them. However, the case manager can send you an interim certificate of findings that may help you with official matters" (Coroners Court of New Zealand, When someone dies suddenly, retrieved 19 August 2026). Ask the coroner's case manager for that interim certificate, and give it to the insurer, rather than waiting.

The third is that no deadline binds the insurer. The Fair Insurance Code's 5 and 10 business day claim timeframes do not apply here, because the Code itself states that it "covers all insurance products, except health insurance and life insurance" (Insurance Council of New Zealand, Fair Insurance Code 2020, retrieved 19 August 2026), a point the Insurance and Financial Services Ombudsman confirms. The only published number we found from any New Zealand life insurer is Chubb Life's aim to "start assessing your claim within five working days of receipt", which is a start, not a decision. If a claim is being held, the free and independent route is the Insurance and Financial Services Ombudsman. We cover the process in how to claim life insurance in NZ.

Honest limits on this page

Partners Life, Chubb Life and Asteron Life do not publish full policy wordings on their own websites. The wordings quoted for those three are the insurers' own branded, version-numbered documents republished by LifeDirect, and we have given the version codes so you can match them against your own. Asteron's newest obtainable edition is dated June 2017, so we cannot confirm it is unchanged.

AIA's wording says the exclusion "applies to any subsequent benefit increase you make" but gives no measuring date for an increase, no inflation carve-out and no statement that it is confined to the increased portion. Pinnacle Life's is silent on reinstatement. We have left those blank rather than assume them.

We found no Financial Markets Authority statement on suicide clauses, and no Ombudsman case study on the subject: a search of the Ombudsman's site returns nothing for the term. That is a gap in New Zealand guidance, not an answer.

For context on scale, and from an official source rather than an insurer: there were 630 suspected self-inflicted deaths in New Zealand in 2024/25, an age-standardised rate of 11.0 per 100,000 population (Health New Zealand, suicide data and statistics, page last updated 22 July 2026, retrieved 19 August 2026). The Chief Coroner recorded 617 in the year to 30 June 2024.

If you are reading this because you are in trouble yourself, please call or text 1737, or Lifeline on 0800 543 354. It is free, it is confidential, and it is answered by people whose job is exactly this.

References

Disclaimer: This article is general information only and does not constitute personalised financial advice. Every policy term on this page is reproduced from the named insurer's own published wording, with the version code and date printed on that document, and wordings are revised over time. The only document that governs your cover is the one issued with your policy. QuoteHub is operated by Craig Smith Business Services Limited, trading as Smiths Insurance and KiwiSaver, a licensed Financial Advice Provider (FSP712931), Christchurch. If you need support, call or text 1737 at any time.

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