Could insuring your pet be more popular than protecting your family?

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Steve Long

Recent research by Ageas Protect has seen that more people are taking out Pet Insurance than Critical Illness Cover.

Pet insurance more popular than Protection Critical Illness insurance covers you if you get one of the numerous medical conditions covered under the policy and is used widely to replace an annual income or even pay off a mortgage.

After conducting the research on over 2000 consumers, Ageas found that 12% of them had taken out Pet Insurance, compared with 9% that had taken out a Critical Illness policy and only 4% who had income protection.

Life insurance was found to be the most popular protection product which had been purchased by 33% of the consumers. Long Term care insurance was the least popular type of insurance; this will cover you if you were unable to perform basic activities of daily living such as dressing, bathing, eating etc and needed someone to care for you – only 1% of people had taken this insurance.

According to the research, consumers were more likely to take a protection product if they had children. From those people with children aged 0-9, 40% had taken out life cover and 43% for those with children aged 10-17. There was also an increase for those who said they would take a critical illness policy which became 14% for those with children aged 0-9 and 15% for those aged 10-17.

Head of Marketing at Ageas Protect, Andy Milburn said, “It is clear parents are willing to pay to protect themselves and their children for a reasonable monthly amount of critical illness cover, which can always be increased at a later date, could be the perfect solution to help educate not only parents, but consumers up and down the country that critical illness cover can be taken out for the same monthly outlay as pet insurance.”

If you don’t have the cover you need to protect your family or your mortgage then Compare Life and Critical illness Insurance Today and get your family covered

Should I buy a Joint Life Insurance policy or two single policies?

Posted on January 27, 2012 by Sally Sheehan

Should I buy a Joint Life Insurance policy or two single policies?

Life insurance can be purchased to cover just yourself or you and your partner in the event of either of you passing away.

Most joint policies pay out on the first death, so if you were to pass away before your partner then your partner would receive the money and the policy would cease, leaving your partner with a lump sum of money but without life insurance themselves.

The other option is to take out separate policies and to be insured for a fixed amount each where it will pay out twice; once on the first death and then again on the second. So even if one of you dies, the other partner is still protected.

There are other policies that will pay out on the second death, this means that if you were to pass away, your partner wouldn’t receive any money, but your family would receive a lump sum of cash once your partner has also passed away.

This type of policy is normally used to cover inheritance tax. If for example your estate is over the inheritance tax threshold then taking out a life insurance policy that pays out on the second death can be an option to ensure that your family do not need to sell any assets like a house or business in order to pay the tax.

Joint policy versus two separate policies

Whether you are better off with a joint policy rather than two separate policies depends almost entirely on what you need to cover.

If you are looking to cover a mortgage only then a joint policy that pays out on the first death will normally be adequate cover. Your mortgage would be paid off in the event of one of you passing away and the remaining partner will at least have some where to live mortgage free.

This is particularly the case if you are covering a repayment mortgage and are looking at a decreasing term life insurance policy as the amount that you are insured for will go down in line with the mortgage and only ever cover the mortgage balance.

If you are looking at leaving your family with some financial protection as well as or instead of mortgage protection then it’s worth considering separate policies.

If you were to take a joint policy for this purpose, again, you are insuring you and your partner on a first death basis, so let’s say you are insured for £100,000, if one of you dies before the other the policy would pay out £100,000 to the remaining partner. If you both died at exactly the same time the policy would still pay out £100,000 to your family.

The issue with this is if one of you dies before the other, the remaining person will be uninsured and have to take out another policy to cover their family. As Life Insurance is cheaper the younger you are, if you then need to come back and take out another policy further down the line, you will inevitably pay more for the new policy.

The other option as discussed earlier, is to take out separate policies for you and your partner, this means that you are insured for £100,000 each, so £200,000 in total. It does work out a little more expensive but relatively works out more cost effective.

40 year old Non-Smoking Male
40 year old Non-Smoking Female
£100,000 over 20 years with Legal and General

Joint policy – £18.69 per month
Separate Policies – £19.39 per month (Male – £10.73 per month, Female – £8.66 per month)

The benefit of taking two separate life insurance policies for you and your partner is the fact that it will pay out twice. If you passed away before your partner, your policy would pay out £100,000, then if your partner passed away during the term of the policy, your family would receive another £100,000.

By purchasing two separate life insurance policies you may also save yourself money in the long run. If the worst happens to one of you, the remaining partner will still be insured paying the same premium they always have been and do not have to worry about taking out another more expensive life insurance policy when they’re older.

Call our life insurance Experts to get a quote on Separate Life Insurance Policies on 0800 5244153 or 01329 550 460 from mobiles.

Can getting advice on life insurance save you money?

Posted on November 19, 2011 by Jon Wigham

Most people buy life insurance and don’t know or sometimes don’t care who they buy from as long it appears to be the right product at the right price. Finding out a bit more about the company that you buy your insurance from could actually save you some money!

Life insurance is sold on an advised or non-advised basis, if you were to go to your Independent financial Advisor and sometimes your bank, then you would more than likely get advised on the right product to take based on your needs. You may also be told that taking other products such as Critical illness, Mortgage Protection or Income Protection are also the right thing for you to purchase.

If you bought your life insurance on a non-advised basis, this would mean that the company that you purchased your life policy from would not advise you but would simply give you all of the facts about the policies available to you and let you make the choice yourself.

Due to the downturn in the economy you are very unlikely to find a policy these days which is part life insurance – part investment (Endowment policy), which turns the life cover aspect into a very very simple type of insurance! Yes, there are a couple of exclusions, which you need to be aware of: suicide, alcohol or drug abuse and being diagnosed with a terminal illness in the last 12 or 18 months of the policy are excluded with some insurers.

The other aspects to consider are the term of policy, how much cover you take and the insurer that you choose. So let’s have a look at how you would decide on each one:

Term of your policy

You can choose between taking a Whole of life policy, which will literally cover you until the day you die however old you are or you choose a period of time between your current age and 90 years old – this is much cheaper, but greatly depends on what you would like to cover.

How much cover?

Think about what you pay out every month and how much money your family would need to pay off any debts or a mortgage. You may want to include funeral costs as well.

Which Insurer?

If you are looking at the big names in life insurance then they more or less cover the same things – life and terminal illness. When you look at Critical Illness or income protection cover it tends to become a little more complicated but you can look at each of the insurers and will soon see the differences between them.

What does it cost to get advice?

If you wish to get Advice from your financial advisor or Bank, you would be looking at paying an upfront fee, much like you do when you take out a mortgage. This normally depends on your monthly premium. You will also be tied into a contract and if you wished to cancel the policy within a certain period of time, you would have to pay a cancellation fee, which can be up to £1000!

What do you lose by not getting advice?

Over the years of providing life insurance we have heard of many customers taking out life insurance on advised basis, sometimes even because of loyalty to friend who is a financial advisor that is charging £20 more per month!

The only difference you will see from not getting advice is that you won’t be told that “This is the policy for you”. We will give you all the information that you need to know, tell you everything about the policies and give you lots of different options, and at your own time – Let You Choose!

If you were investing money then it makes complete sense to pay for the advice, let the experts tell you where you should put your money to make the most out of it, but for such a simple product, do you need someone to charge you more money to tell you what to do?

Would you get advice on your Car Insurance?

The majority of people in the UK will buy their Car Insurance online these days, as you can search all the insurers and compare the different cover that they offer, then pop your direct debit details or credit card details in online and you’re covered!

Why should life insurance be any different?

Compare Life Insurance online and see how much you could save!

Life Insurance for Women

Posted on October 19, 2011 by Sally Sheehan

Life Insurance for Women

Life insurance much like car insurance is cheaper for women than it is for men. The reason for this is because men are usually seen as a higher risk to insure and hence their policies more likely to be claimed on.

Insurers base the risk of life insurance on the average life expectancy of a women being longer than a man’s. Currently in the UK, it is 77.2 years old for a male and 81.6 years old for a female.

The life insurance providers know that they are less likely to pay out for a female as the chances of them passing away sooner is much smaller and therefore can justify a cheaper premium.

This however, is set to change due to a European Court Ruling made in March 2011, which states as of December 2012, insurers will no longer be allowed to charge different premiums solely on the basis of Gender. This will inevitably mean that women will see a rise in the cost of their life insurance policies.

The example below shows the difference in the monthly premium between a male and female, they are based on both applicants being born on 8 May 1970 taking out £100,000 life insurance over a 20 year term on 23 May 2011:

Male £11.56 per month

Female £9.41 per month

Why take out life insurance?

Life insurance is a safety net to ensure that your family do not suffer financially as a result of your death. If you have dependants or a partner who relies on your income, whether it is for living expenses or housing costs such as rent or mortgage repayments, it is wise to have a life insurance policy in place that guarantees your family are protected.

Women are increasingly becoming the main earners in their households, making it just as important to be equally well insured as men. More shockingly, approximately 50% of the UK adult population are still without any life insurance at all in place to protect their family.

To put this into perspective, without life insurance protection and if you were to die, how would your family;

Protect the household income
Cover the mortgage
Cover Funeral costs
Cover Children’s Education costs

Another aspect which few people consider is the death of a partner if they are a stay at home parent. If the worst happened and this person died, who would look after the children whilst you were at work? Although it’s not paid work, this can lead to very serious financial implications.

Potentially either the surviving parent would have to work less in order to spend more time looking after the family or they would have to pay for a nanny, possibly a cleaner and neither of which have never been budgeted for.

With circumstances like these it’s unwise if not irresponsible to not have life cover in place.

Will Life Insurance premiums for women rise?

The European Court Ruling made in March 2011 will put an end to women paying cheaper premiums than men; this will start from December 2012.

Life and car insurance are the two main areas which will be affected and they have up until now argued that they should be able to charge different rates for men and women based on different risks to each group.

Evidence shows that women are less likely to be involved in accidents or make expensive claims than men, so they pay less for their car insurance.

As noted above, women’s life expectancy is statistically longer than men’s; previously therefore men have been seen as more of a risk so insurers charge a higher rate.

However, due to the new equality laws, this will become a thing of the past.

When is the best time for Women to buy life insurance?

If you are considering organising your life insurance then now is a really good time. As long as you take out a guaranteed premium type (which is the only type we sell) then your premium will stay exactly the same for the life of your policy. You will always pay the same premium however old you are.

So it stands to reason that it’s far more cost effective to buy your life insurance now and fix the monthly price you’ll pay at a cheaper rate before the premiums rise to match the prices for men.

So even when the law changes next year you will still pay the same premium that you bought the policy at today. Even if it’s only cheaper by two pounds, on a 20 year policy this will save you £480!

Regardless of whether you’re male or female, life insurance is currently the cheapest it has been for the last 10 years.

If you have a current policy it may be worth checking to see if you can save money on it. We save people hundreds of pounds over the life of their policy every day and often even more money if your existing policy was purchased through a bank or financial advisor.

See how much you could save on your life insurance!

Life insurance and Critical Illness pay outs continue to rise

Posted on August 17, 2011 by Jon Wigham

The Association of British Insurers (ABI) has revealed that an increasing amount is being paid out to those who hold Critical illness and Life insurance policies in the UK.

A total of £1.9 Billion was paid out last year to families and individuals with an average pay-out of £47,166 – this is nearly twice the average salary in the UK.

Back in 2007 the number of claims being rejected reached 16%, since then the industry has taken action to help policyholders to become better informed about life insurance and the application process to reduce the number of claims being rejected.

In 2010, most insurers had a pay out of over 95% for life insurance and over 90% for Critical Illness claims. The main reasons that an insurer rejects a pay-out are non-disclosure – if you don’t disclose everything on your application the insurer may decline your claim; and not meeting the policy definition. For example; if you were diagnosed with blindness or deafness, if it was a temporary condition then the insurer wouldn’t normally pay out, however, if it resulted in permanent and irreversible symptoms then the insurer would pay out the sum assured.

It is very important that you answer all of the health and lifestyle questions truthfully and disclose any medication that you take or any medical conditions you have had, otherwise it could mean that you are not covered.

Our unique application process whether you apply online or by phone will ensure that everything is covered and all the things that you need to disclose are on your application.

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