FEGLI Conversion After Retirement: The 31-Day Window and Individual Policies

When Conversion Is Your Only Option

FEGLI conversion exists for one specific situation: your group coverage is ending and you want to continue life insurance without proving you're healthy enough to qualify. This happens most commonly when you separate from federal service without meeting the five-year continuous enrollment requirement — or when you voluntarily cancel a coverage type and change your mind within the 31-day extension window.

Conversion is not a retirement planning strategy for most people. It's an emergency exit ramp.

The 31-Day Extension and Conversion Privilege

When any portion of your FEGLI coverage terminates — whether because you don't meet the five-year rule, you're taking a deferred retirement, or you voluntarily cancel coverage — you receive Standard Form 2819 (Notice of Conversion Privilege). This triggers a 31-day temporary extension of coverage at no cost. During those 31 days, you're still covered under the group policy even though you're no longer paying premiums.

Within that 31-day window, you can apply to convert your terminated group coverage to an individual whole life policy. The conversion is guaranteed issue — the insurance carrier (currently MetLife, the FEGLI contractor) cannot deny you regardless of health conditions.

Here's what makes this important: the 31-day window is hard. If you die during the 31-day extension period, OFEGLI pays the full group benefit — even if you haven't applied for conversion. But once the 31 days expire without an application, both the temporary coverage and the conversion right are gone permanently.

What Conversion Actually Gets You

The individual policy you receive through conversion is a commercial whole life contract, not a continuation of your federal group policy. Key differences:

Premiums are substantially higher. The conversion policy is priced using standard commercial attained-age rates for whole life insurance. Because it's guaranteed issue with no medical exam, the carrier assumes adverse selection — the people most likely to convert are those who can't qualify for coverage elsewhere. Expect premiums several times higher than what you were paying under the group plan.

Coverage amounts may differ. You can convert the full amount of the terminated coverage or a lesser amount, but you cannot convert more than you had. If you were carrying $10,000 of Option A and it terminates, you can convert up to $10,000.

The policy is completely separate from OPM. Once converted, your coverage is a private contract between you and the commercial insurer. OPM has no involvement in claims, premiums, or policy administration. You cannot appeal premium increases to your HR office or to OPM.

Conversion vs. Continuation: Know the Difference

The most common confusion in FEGLI retirement planning is mixing up conversion (SF 2819) with continuation (SF 2818). They are completely different mechanisms:

Continuation (SF 2818) keeps your group coverage active as a retiree. You stay in the FEGLI pool, get the group rates, and make your reduction elections. This is what most retirees do — and it requires meeting the five-year enrollment rule.

Conversion (SF 2819) exits the group plan entirely and moves you to an individual commercial policy at significantly higher rates. This is what you do when you can't continue — either because you don't meet the five-year rule or because you're taking a deferred retirement where coverage permanently terminates.

Filing the wrong form creates problems that OPM cannot fix after the fact.

Deferred Retirement: Conversion Is Your Only Path

If you separate from federal service with at least five years of creditable civilian service but don't qualify for an immediate annuity, you're on the deferred retirement track. Your annuity begins at age 62, but all FEGLI and FEHB coverage terminates permanently at separation. When your deferred annuity finally starts, you cannot reinstate FEGLI — the coverage is gone for good.

Your only FEGLI continuation option at separation is the 31-day conversion window. Whether conversion makes sense depends entirely on what the private market offers someone of your age and health status at that point.

Postponed Retirement: A Different Story

Postponed retirement (MRA+10 with delayed annuity start to avoid the 5%-per-year reduction) works differently. During the postponement gap, FEGLI is suspended — not terminated. Once your postponed annuity begins, you can fully reinstate FEGLI coverage, provided you met the five-year rule at your original separation date.

The critical timing issue: you must start your postponed annuity before your 62nd birthday. If you wait until exactly age 62, OPM reclassifies your application as a deferred retirement, and your FEGLI reinstatement right disappears.

Is Conversion Ever Worth It?

For most healthy separating employees, conversion is a poor deal. The guaranteed-issue premium surcharge makes the coverage expensive relative to what you'd pay for a medically underwritten term or whole life policy on the private market.

Conversion makes sense in one narrow scenario: you're uninsurable or have serious health conditions that would result in denial or rated premiums from private carriers, and you need life insurance coverage that you can't obtain any other way.

For a complete walkthrough of how FEGLI continuation, conversion, and private replacement interact — including the paperwork sequence and decision points — the FEGLI Retirement Decision Guide maps every path from five years out through your first annuity payment.

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