WAEPA
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| Nonprofit | |
| Industry | Insurance: Group Term Life |
| Founded | 1943 |
| Headquarters | Falls Church, Virginia, U.S. |
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Area served
|
Worldwide |
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Key people
|
Shane Canfield, CEO |
| Products | Life Insurance, Long Term Care Insurance, Financial Education |
| Revenue |
 $33.7 million USD (2016) |
| Website | www |
Worldwide Assurance for Employees of Public Agencies, widely known by its abbreviated name WAEPA, is a United States' nonprofit 501(c)(9) VEBA association headquartered in Falls Church, Virginia, that provides life insurance and financial service benefits to federal civilian employees. Before WAEPA, civilian employees had limited life insurance options until the Federal Employees' Group Life Insurance Act of 1954 provided group life insurance by the U.S. Government. WAEPA's insurance products are underwritten by the New York Life Insurance Company. The association has over 44,000 members from every civilian agency of the Federal government.
WAEPA was formed during World War II, when, at the request of U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt, U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr. contacted life insurance companies throughout the country asking if they would provide a maximum of $10,000 of life coverage for civilian government employees serving in war zones. At the time, United States civilians who chose to serve their country by entering foreign service did so with the knowledge that their current coverage in life insurance was largely vitiated by restrictive clauses covering travel in war zones, overseas aviation, etc.
Finding the insurance rates to be cost prohibitive, Morgenthau formed an informal committee made up of officials from the Office of Lend-Lease Administration, Board of Economic Warfare, Office of Foreign Relief and Rehabilitation Operations and the United States Office of War Information to investigate the possibility of attaining group life coverage. The first inquiry was made into extending the provisions of the National Service Life Insurance Act to include civilian foreign service personnel, however the Bureau of the Budget was opposed to revising the law to make them eligible. Additional efforts were made to gain membership into The American Foreign Service Protective Association, formed in 1929 for American Foreign Service Officers, but eligibility was restricted only to members of the Department of State.
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Wikipedia