Viators who are ill and often desperate may be at the mercy of viatical companies. Under a regulation developed by the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC), viators would be guaranteed to receive a minimum payment that is based on a sliding scale according to life expectancy.
For instance, a viator with an estimated life expectancy of six months would receive 80 percent of a policy’s face value, but someone expected to live 18 to 36 months would receive 60 percent. To date, however, just nine states (Arkansas, Connecticut, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Minnesota, Mississippi, Oklahoma, and Vermont) have chosen to adopt the payment schedule.
