Andrew Merricks, Managing Director of investments at Birmingham-based financial adviser Skerritt Consultants, counsels that it is very irresponsible of people not to have Life Assurance and/or Critical Illness Insurance as he maintains that life has two major threats – either being alive too long and passing away too early.  “Its absolutely vital to have some insurance in place – particularly if you have got small childern,” he states. “In these unsettled times you need to  asemble your own little welfare state because no one else is can do it for you.”

Greg Suttcliffe at Best Deal says now is the right time to buy such policies as there are many very cheap premiums about due to to the intense vying for business within the insurance market. “The cost of life insurance has fallen – gone down by about 42 per cent in 3 years. It has never been so cheap,” he says. “The critical illness market paid out on eighty three per cent of claims in 2005 – increasing from 79 per cent  the during the last year.”

Make sure you check what insurances you already have before you take out any more.  Do you have any investment policies or does your company pension plan give you any cover?

The easiest way to calculate how much cover you require is to add up how much you would require to provide the same standard of living over a year and then times it by 25 years.  The minimum amount needed should settle all debts and and leave a lump sum for your family.

Obtaining the best deal.
When choosing your policy it is very important to read the manual that many insurers have of the illnesses and conditions that they deal with. It will record everything and should be clear-cut and simple to understand.  You will also need to see the documentation of the main points of the insurance which will take account of all exclusions and benefits.

When people take on the responsibility of a mortgage they are more often than not counselled to take out critical illness protection but should look around and not just take the first insurance cover suggested.

If you start paying these premiums when you are younger they are considerably cheaper, very different to leaving it until you are older, when the policy goes up quite substantially.

Insurance premiums can also be lowered by stopping smoking cigarettes.  Mary Lakes, manager of protection insurance at This is Money says “Giving up smoking can save people a significant amount of money as well as hopefully bringing a longer and better quality of life.”

If you stop smoking you can knock as much as a quarter off life, critical illness cover and income protection insurance payments because the data that we now have shows that smoking can cause serious illness and exacerbates any other existing health conditions.

If your circumstances change you may have to alter your policy.

Under no circumstances believe that once you have purchased your insurance policy that you can just keep on with your life insurance and dismiss it. constantly be very mindful of the insurance you have and make certain that, should your circumstances alter, or, is about to change your insurance policy must accommodate these alterations. Perceivable examples are changing jobs, or or maybe you would like to have more children; regularly consider anything that may raise your living costs and must be to be covered if you are taken ill and are unable to work.

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It is awful but true that 1 in 5 of us will suffer some form of cancer before the age of 65. Katie Summers,a director at Fiona Price & Partners,a firm of Independent Financial Advisors, says “That’s why protection is imperative” – those are not good odds,”Life Assurance is the most general cover taken out, even though it is doutful as to whether it is the most important.  Life cover is imperative if you have a husband or wife or children but not if you are alone as it pays out after you die.  Some people believe that they can’t afford take out Life Assurance but the reality is that they can’t afford not to have it if they have a wife and children to protect and support.  Simmons and Simmons a firm of Independent Financial Advisors reveals in a current survey that 25 per cent of people with children don’t know if they have Life Assurance or not and 25% don’t have it.

Many employment packages incorporate Life insurance but they are by and large not enough to provide an income for a wife or husband with dependants and pay the mortgage off.  A typical guideline is to insure yourself for 15 times your income.

Tesco Finance’s investigations have revealed that during the last fifteen years the average price of Life Insurance Cover has dropped forty two per cent simply because people appear to be living longer due to some extent to medical advances allowing sick people to recover from illness that, at one time, they would most likely have died from. And if you want to find the best life insurance online simply googlr for “life insurance” and then you’ll find the cheapest life insurance. Those who already have life insurance cover are perhaps not aware of this detail and will not gain anything except for when a claim is made, so ought not to feel that they have to stay with their present insurance company – there may well be much better deals around now.

Then again, Critical Illness and Permanent Health insurance premiums are on the increase because people are surviving serious illness and are making a claim on the policy.  These types of life insurance are extremely vital and should be budgeted for if there are no dependants. Maybe you should ask yourself the question, can I afford not to have an income?  For a lot  of us the response is no and all should have income protection insurance.

Income Protection Insurance settles a tax-free income which is calculated on a percentage of your income for ‘non-critical’ as well as critical illness and for the complete length of time that you are unable to work.

Critical Illness cover, if you become potentially terminally ill, will pay out a tax-free lump sum,, which should help to ease financial pressures or provide for any alterations that may be indispensable if your mobility has been affected.  Statutory sick paywill not pay out anything like enough to help with  the financial impact that serious illness can cause.

The insurer calculates a premium on your risk profile.  If you have a family history of critical illness or drink excessively or smoke a few cigarettes a day your premium will be much higher.  Premiums are gauged on the individual person but if one or more of your family have been critically ill, particularly younger than the age of 45, this could raise your premium by forty nine per cent.

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Nothing is more distressing in life than to be diagnosed with a serious or severe condition. Matters are made much worse when your insurance company tells you that they will not pay out on your critical illness insurance or private health policy for the Cancer or HIV you are suffering from.

You are told to read sub-clause six of paragraph 326 of the small print, which tells you that you have been diagnosed with the  wrong type of cancer. Only the first five days of your treatment will be paid for and only tumours below the knee are covered, then it’s down to you to find the finance.

This scenario may sound ridiculous, but in spite of brokers and insurers being regulated, this type of procedure continues to take place. It has been a slow process to clean up the industry and to make certain that consumers get a fair deal.

A little while ago Cancer Backup, a registered charity, highlighted this predicament by organising a large assortment of  shopping surveys, which exposed some alarming facts about the private medical insurance companies. It found that of nearly all the leading insurers only HAS provided life cover for cancer patients right through the length of their illness. Only  the initial treatment is covered by the majority of health insurance companies. Treatment or care over a longperiod, such as hormone replacement or chemotherapy is not normally included.

While insurers and brokers want to finance long term cover for insurance holders with severe illnesses, they won’t always make it clear to would be customers, at the time of taking out the policy what they are covered for.

Although both  Cancer Backup and Macmillan Cancer support have been in talks with similarestablishments within the market to raise the standard of sales practices and make the wording of insurance documents much clearer, progress has been slow since the report was published two years ago.

Private medical insurance and critical illness cover  is usually taken out by clients who are relatively hale and hearty. Getting cancer is the last thing to cross their mind. That is why it is imperative to specify a policy’s exclusions before they sign.

A statement of best practice for insurance companies writing and selling medical policies has been revised recently by the Association of British Insurers, which is a welcome step in the proper direction.

The market body has now proposed that life insurance companies and providers selling these forms of insurance should set up similar case studies, which explain the circumstances when an insurance policy will or will not be paid. Regrettably insurance providers are not obliged to adhere to this code, which is optional.

While the ABI’s initiative is to be embraced, the best way of explaining an insurance policy is by asking the salesman to explicate the small print.

Furthermore, industry jargon is in spite of everything even now being used by insurers to baffle the customer. For example it is not right to categorize cancer as an acute or chronic illness, argues Cancer Backup. On the other hand insurers are resolute that it should go in the acute group. customers are only told about this when they make a claim.

Even though the  Association of British Insurers have got their responsibilities right, the life insurance companies can only be forced to better their principles by the regulator. Improved training of call centre staff, who sell the bulk of the policies, is also long overdue.

More rigorous marketing procedures are required with jargon being eliminated. At the end of the day it it is the job of  the insurersinsurance companies to make sure that their clients fully comprehend the small print of their policies before they sign the document.

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The over fifties life insurance plans are selling like hot cakes.
They promise acceptance without medical questions and are regularly promoted by mature personalities like Jerry Hall and David Frost. Consumers who buy these plans may be paying a lot more in than their recipients will get out.
Guaranteeing a settlement on the insurance holders death, payments start from around eight pounds rising to around £60. Being sold to people between fifty and eighty the settlement is controlled by the payments paid, gender and age when the policy commences.

Significantly, no enquiries about their health are made.  Some insurance plans stop after a specific amount of time, but will still be valid until the policyholder dies. In other insurance schemes the premium is taken until the holder dies, on the other hand insurance holders can put more in than they get out depending upon when they die.

Referring to adverts for Axa Sun Life plan, Peter Chadborn of independent financial advisers Masons Financial Planning Ltd says ‘I can’t understand David Frostapproving this kind of product. He is a first-class act, but for this type of plan the same cannot be said.’

A director at Axa Sun Life plan, Joel Winters defends Havers’s role, saying he is only making consumers aware of the insurance plans existence , for which there is a terrific demand .He states, ‘The interest is their affordability because of their assured acceptance procedure and the low payments.’

Still, you could get an even better plan elsewhere buying regular policy on the same terms ‘People could get 3 or 4 times as much for their money from a normal life insurance cover, in return for replying to a few questions.’ Says George Meakins of Clarence financial services.

Not demanding any health questions forces more expensive fees as these plans interest customers with pre-existing illnesses who may pass away before the Insurance Company has covered its cost. Insurance companies also freeze any payouts for the first two or three years to  safeguard themselves. A refund of the premiums made is in general repaid if a policyholder departs this life of natural causes in this time.

The Manager of financial services at Marks and Spencer, Harrison Timms, admits that the price may be less for standard life cover but usually by the time you reach your 50’s, many have experienced some sort of medical condition, as a result this is why peopleprefer the over fifties policies. Insurance holders’paying in more than they ever get backis one area he doesn’t agree with. ‘When we put together our plan we decided to put a cap on the premiums,’ he says, meaning once the insurance policyholders have paid the amount insured their paymentscease.
Some over-fifties plans do sooner or later have cut off points, but lots of customers have paid over the oddsbefore they reach this point. Premiums normally cease at 90 with the LV plans and the post office running them for a set term.

The main reason people takeout these policies is to pay interment expenses. However, the ultimate settlement might not be enough money. A pre-payment policy could be a better selection with Old Mutual funeral care offering 3 packages priced between 2,548 pounds and 3,095 pounds. This type of plan can be paid for over three years.

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