There is a legal way of avoiding payment of sometimes outrageous inheritance taxes whose rates vary from country to country. Another tip, experts ask that one regularly check their insurance at work to avoid getting to spend money on life insurance you already have as part of your company benefits, this allows you to allocate the funds to other investments or needs. The move of placing your policy allows immediate release of funds from the insurance company without the usual time consuming process. Under a life insurance policy, it is necessary to have courts to determine if there are no other claimants to the estate (which includes proceeds from insurance cover if it wasn’t written in trust), have it published in newspapers to determine that no other claims are filed, computed for inheritance taxes and then released. The process takes time and can leave you high and dry during the funeral, and burial which all have costs associated with them.