Critical illness cover

MFunnell

Is critical illness cover worth having? My partner and I are both 39, non- smokers, earning a combined £40,000 with a mortgage of about £150,000 in a £300,000 house.

Jamz

So you want your home to be covered should you suffer a heart attack or brain aneurysm and cannot work? If the answer is yes then get the cover..

My Dad suffered a Brain Aneurysm and he had only just remortgaged and his cover paid out, he's lucky though as he has made a full recovery now and is back at work.. but back at work minus his mortgage....

dunstonh

This is a bit of an FAQ. Here is the usual response.

Just ask anyone who has made a claim on CI and they will tell you soon enough that it was worthwhile.

Stats wise, 1 in 6 are likely to suffer a claimable event before retirement. Only a little less than 1 in 5 men likely to die before retirement.

At age 39, you may have left it a bit late to get really affordable CI cover for the level of sum assured desirable as you are right in the period when many of the claimable events start to hit.

From a professional point of view, i have had far more client claim on CI cover in the last 3 years than on life cover.

humfer

Only you can really decide that. Stats wise you should be fine, but obviously piece of mind comes into it. I suppose you have to look at it from the point of view that if something happened to one of you how would you pay the mortgage?

Frugal_Foxy

i've just been reading about critical illness cover - various websites, guardian newspaper has good stuff - recommend reading it, especially for the stuff it says about 'commission' earned by the 'sellers'. the OFT (office of fair trading) are looking into huge mis-selling, ie you get sold a policy and it wont pay out for your particular problem. one insurance company wouldn't pay out when a guy was diagnosed with terminal cancer because the hospital couldn't diagnose 'which' cancer it was! (although they did in the end when the claimant went 'public'). best not to trust any of them but to read every tiny word in the policy document and t&c's and ask lots of questions. it's also good to ask what percentage of payments to claimants they achieve, ie if a company only pays out to, say, 10% of all claims made, it can't be that good, can it?

interestingly, they say that 'income protection' policies pays out in many cases where critical illness cover doesn't, ie bad back, etc. i am looking for cover in case i can't ever work and realise that this may be better for me. i just want to be able to pay my bills if i can't work, regardless of whether it's a serious disease or just something minor/temporary. (i don't have any debts, it's just for normal monthly outgoings and mortgage).

i am only at the beginning of my investigation and foresee much reading before i decide. however, i did want to ask Martin if he would look into these two types of insurance cover and let us have his findings.

good health to everyone

SMARTY29A_2

i have just recently taken out critical illness cover after my mum of 65 years was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia at 2 pm and then died at 5.15 pm of a brain haemorrhage so with two daughters i thought it would be wise to takenn out critical illness cover. i took it though a great insurance company , the gentleman andy was most helpful and arrnged everything for me including more life insurance at a very competivve price so i would certainly advise him.

i havent his email here at the moment but please get back in touch with me here or email me
Brenda.Smart@homecall.co.uk and i will pass on his email address and number to you.

Frugal_Foxy

does everyone else think that it was awfully nice of that nice insurance salesman to sell her some additional life insurance at the same time?! it's a shame that other insurance companies don't offer the same service.

i was trying to explain to my elderly father about reducing his car insurance premiums. no need! he spoke to a very nice man on the phone about renewing with the same company, who, surprisingly, even 'bothered' to ask him how many days a week he drives and if he parks it in a garage and told my dad he would give him a special price for being a low mileage driver. he was, according to both my mum and dad, a very nice man :rolleyes:

take care everyone

SMARTY29A_2

Just to let you know, the " nice" insurance man didnt try to sell me any life insurance. I got the quotation online and it was myself that wanted the extra life insurance, absolutely no persuasion from the independant insurance man at all!!!!!!!!!!!

dunstonh

i've just been reading about critical illness cover - various websites, guardian newspaper has good stuff - recommend reading it, especially for the stuff it says about 'commission' earned by the 'sellers'. the OFT (office of fair trading) are looking into huge mis-selling, ie you get sold a policy and it wont pay out for your particular problem.

Yawn....

This rubbish spouts its head from time to time but the vast majority of plans pay out with no problems. The occassional one doenst and the press only pick up on those. Such as the person that took out critical illness and complained when the insurance company didnt pay out. Turned out they hadnt disclosed a heart attack on the questionnaire.

best not to trust any of them

Stupid comment.

interestingly, they say that 'income protection' policies pays out in many cases where critical illness cover doesn't, ie bad back, etc. i am looking for cover in case i can't ever work and realise that this may be better for me. i just want to be able to pay my bills if i can't work, regardless of whether it's a serious disease or just something minor/temporary. (i don't have any debts, it's just for normal monthly outgoings and mortgage).

PHI is above CI on the needs list. However, many PHI plans require full advice authorisation whereas CI plans do not. So dont expect to get full PHI consideration from someone not able to advise on it.

MFunnell

Stats wise, 1 in 6 are likely to suffer a claimable event before retirement. Only a little less than 1 in 5 men likely to die before retirement.

If these two events are equally likely, how come critical illness premiums are much higher than those for death?

dunstonh

If these two events are equally likely, how come critical illness premiums are much higher than those for death?

Harder to get re-assurers for CI than life cover and they have been concerned about an increasing trend where people are less likely to die but more likely to suffer a claimable CI event.