What do you insure??

lemonade_lifestyle

I'm interesed to know what everyone insures each year and what people don't bother with.

I am having the post christmas clear out and have found I have all sorts of different policies coming out of my ears!!

I'll make a start on the essentials:-
Car insurance
House insurance
Life insurance - what type of life insurance does everyone have? We have a decreasing term policy (in conjunction with mortgage) and it also has critical illness cover. Took this out 8 years ago, is it worth a new look for something else??
Home Emergency Cover - Lloyds TSB & Royal Sun Alliance (this only covers a payout per emergency of £300!! for £5.25 a month) Is this worth it??
And we have a lloyds tsb platinum account which has travel insurance, mobile phone insurance, credit card insurance....etc... Am considering cancelling this level of account!!



It gets to a point where you have insurances that cover the same things as other insurance policies......................
Homeserve are a culprit, what do they really insure you for?? And can you get a more comprehensive policy elsewhere??

Sorry to ramble, just would like some input......:rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

lisyloo

I don't have critical illness, I don't like it becuase it only pays a lump sum and only covers certain illnesses.
I have PHI which provides an Income until retirement if you cannot work and I think that's much better on both counts.

I don't have home emergency cover. They only literally cover emergencies (so will for example turn your water off rather than fixing the problem).
Unless you are completely clueless or physically disabled this is a waste of money IMO.

I don't have mobile phone insurance or credit card insurance. I take great care of my things and take precautions (like putting them in a safe) and have never had a need for these.

I have the normal hosue, car, life, travel etc. but don't have the gimmicky one like washing machine etc.

I do consider PHI to be important and private medical cover is desirable if you can afford it.

dunstonh

Life insurance - what type of life insurance does everyone have? We have a decreasing term policy (in conjunction with mortgage) and it also has critical illness cover. Took this out 8 years ago, is it worth a new look for something else??

Life assurance is not a product its a category with many different types of policies to cover different needs. It doesnt matter what someone else has. Its important that the right one is for you.

Yearly renewable term assurance
Yearly renewable decreasing term assurance
Level term assurance
decreasing term assurance
increasing term assurance (assume decreasing version exists on most of the following)
renewable term assuance
renewable convertible term assurance
convertible term assurance
pension term assurance
FSAVC term assurance
death in service
family income benefit
whole of life assurance
single premium whole of life assurance
endowment
low cost endowment
single premium endowment.
limited payment period whole of life assurance.
life insurance (not assurance - indicating that more excessive terms may apply - such as over 50s plans)

There are others and variations within those but I am going to stop there. You then get guaranteed premiums and reviewable premiums on most of those which will impact on cost and terms. There are also bolt on options or segmentation (where multiple plans can be held under one plan) with those such as critical illness cover (which may come in different levels), permanent health insurance (proper income protection -although different levels apply), payment protection (budget income protection), waiver of premium etc.

dont forget your retirement planning as you are effectively paying to insure an income in retirement. Plus the lump sum is payable on death as well.

tinkerbell84

I have

* car insurance on all my cars
* motorbike insurance on my bikes
* buildings and contents insurance on my houses, contents on my London flat (my jewellery is insured under one of these policies)
* annual travel insurance

we don't bother with life insurance, but might if we had children.

lisyloo

we don't bother with life insurance, but might if we had children.

This is an interesting one, because one argument is that you don't need it because your house could be sold.
However one issue with that is that houses are not always very liquid (and the current market is a very good example of that).

I think it could cause some difficulty for family if they have to meet bills (like council tax and insurance) for potentially a long time and have no payout.
Of course as you get older your private pension funds are available and as you age these get bigger.

I not necessarily talking about tinkerbell as I have no idea about that situation, but jsut generally it could be an issue.
But insurance is always a trade-off - if you bought everything you'd have no income so you have to draw the line somewhere and decide on what's important.

tinkerbell84

lisyloo wrote: »

This is an interesting one, because one argument is that you don't need it because your house could be sold.
However one issue with that is that houses are not always very liquid (and the current market is a very good example of that).

I think it could cause some difficulty for family if they have to meet bills (like council tax and insurance) for potentially a long time and have no payout.
Of course as you get older your private pension funds are available and as you age these get bigger.

I not necessarily talking about tinkerbell as I have no idea about that situation, but jsut generally it could be an issue.
But insurance is always a trade-off - if you bought everything you'd have no income so you have to draw the line somewhere and decide on what's important.

As it is at the moment, we have no debt except the mortgages. We could afford quite easily to service those and the other normal bills on 1 income. So unless something happened to both of us we'd be okay.

If something happened to one of us, our death in service money would wipe out most of the mortgage debt anyway

The only reason we'd take insurance if we had children is because if something happened to one of us, the other might have to give up/reduce work in order to care for the children alone. This is where insurance monies would come in. Even though the mortgage would be less (from the death in service money), if income were significantly reduced, it could make things difficult.

Hope this makes sense.

lemonade_lifestyle

lisyloo wrote: »

But insurance is always a trade-off - if you bought everything you'd have no income so you have to draw the line somewhere and decide on what's important.

This is very true.

As far as life insurance goes, need to have a good look around for something to suit our lifestyle. Originally it was sold to us whilst buying the house and we were bit naive at time!!

My pension should be sorted, work for NHS and have done since i was 21!!


BUT ITS STILL THAT WHAT IF??????? surely you can't be covered for all eventualities....:rotfl:

lisyloo

our death in service money would wipe out most of the mortgage debt anyway

Death in service benefits are quite acceptable in my view.
The only proviso if that you obviously have to remember to review when you lose or chnage jobs, but I'd do that automatically as the type of job I do usually has numerous benefits attached.

BUT ITS STILL THAT WHAT IF??????? surely you can't be covered for all eventualities....:rotfl:

Some things are better off managed via an "emergency fund" e.g. a pot of money put by in a savings account or cash ISA.
This would get you by in an emergency and would typically be 3-6 months income.
Some people only find out through experience that EVEN if you have insurance you might not get paid out immediately e.g. car insurers could take months to pay out.
If you have this fund you can manage all but the most dire emergencies.

There will always be things you can't insure for like divorce or unplanned preganancy.

My take on it is that it's not possessions or houses that are important, but health, family and relationships.
I know that in the absolute worse case my family would feed me and not see me sleeping on the streets.

You should try to plan, but you are right, you cannot cover everything.
We are lucky in this country that we have the safety net of the welfare state. It might not be great but it's better than what a lot of people have on a global scale.
I would prefer to make my own provision, but worst case I would be taken care of by benefits and/or family.

movilogo

I have following insurance:

• Building & contents (claimed once for building)
• Car (claimed once so far)
• Central Heating (claimed 3 times)

It seems that whatever insurance I take, I've to claim. So, now I won't take any new insurances (unless mandatory like car, building)

~Brock~

movilogo wrote: »

It seems that whatever insurance I take, I've to claim. So, now I won't take any new insurances (unless mandatory like car, building)

I don't understand the logic in that statement. Are you saying that you have been put off having insurance because you have had to claim?