Life insurance quotes cheaper than our IFA's?

ACG

It sounds like he might be going after the easy sale, its not uncommon. Statistically more CI is sold than Income Protection (im not sure why though)...its widely believed its cheaper and the easier sale, personally i disagree - i think its a lack of product knowldege for a lot of advisors, or going after the easy sale (ie £100k mortgage = £100k cover).

Obviously i cant say what you need/dont need on here, your advisor has done the fact find and has to justify why he has recommended what he has.

From a personal perspective, ive taken out IP - thats how much i belive in it. I do also believe in CI but i havnt taken any out because id rather have a guaranteed income for any reason i cant work rather than a lump sum for 30+ conditions, but thats just my opinion.

Beckyy

Thanks ACG, I appreciate the replies. We'll see what happens Friday, I'll clue myself up a bit more on the life insurance, and if he can justify his products to me then I'll happily go through him. I'm just not sure if he will on this occassion.

Having also said he'll be looking for house/contents insurance, landlord insurance quotes and offering to write up the tenancy agreement for our current house when let (none of which we need from him). I think the easy sale might be hitting the nail on the head.

Beckyy

So the plan for OH is to go with Legal and General. LTA £100,000 for 25yr with critical illness through moneyworld.co.uk. L&G offer 4% discount when paying annually, which I might do as I hate having a list of monthly DD and can't see any reason not to. I'm taking the details in with me this afternoon. With a £5 per month difference to his quote I can't see me taking his out. I'll give him to opportunity to advise me why I should and the option to alter his quotes, but I doubt he'd knock one out commisson-free for the sake of a £30 fee - I don't think I would if I was him.

Beckyy

When I went in to see our advisor I was pleasantly suprised when he said he could match the quotes I emailed him. He then went on to say I must have made a mistake in my quote and got them for decreasing term insurance, as there's no way I could get LTA assurance at that price. When I said it was for LTA I had to show him moneyworld.com for him to believe the quotes, he had no idea you could buy it that cheap elsewhere and said he couldn't understand how they did it.

He said he would never recommend doing it (I wouldn't expect him to though) and that you have no back up with execution only etc. but with a difference of about £4 a month, I think we'll go through moneyworld.com. It's just a precautionary measure, so although I appreciate his effort, I don't want to pay more than necessary for it.

Thank you for all the replies - they've been very helpful.

opinions4u

It is totally refreshing to see an individual research stuff, ask questions, challenge belief systems and weigh up the pros and cons of the different ways of going about things before making the decision to purchase.

Very impressed.

kingstreet

... and no mention of trusts by anyone other than the advisers.

A trust is a "product" steeped in the best advice for the "policyholder" which earns nothing for anyone, but which an adviser KNOWS is the best way a protection product should be written.

A few years ago, I visited a well-known former international cricket captain who had purchased a flexible unit-linked, whole-life policy from a relative who worked as a direct-sales person for a well-known life office.

It was written own-life, own-benefit and would have added £500k to the policyholder's estate had he died.

I managed to get a refund of the premiums paid to the existing policy (£7,300) and an agreement by the insurer to reissue a term assurance on the same terms, written in trust (by us) which took care of the client's needs the way they should have been addressed in the first place.

The value of my experience and expertise can be far above any saving in monthly premiums you can get from buying online.

Beckyy

Very valid point kingstreet. But our advisor was very against writing it in trust, and that was after I brought it up myself otherwe it wouldn't have been mentioned at all. He didn't seem at all concerned, or mention the implications of the money being taxed if the estate went above the inhritance tax threshold. Just said to write mirror wills, which I don't think is necessarily great advice for an unmarried couple if the idea of the policy is to pay the money to the spouse to clear the mortgage if the other died.

I'm happy to put the policy into trust ourselves if OH wants to though, and will make sure I do plenty of research on it beforehand.

ACG

Its a no brainer to put the policies into trust.
A split trust will ensure the plan owner keeps any critical illness payment but the beneficiary would receive the life insurance payment.

kingstreet

Too much Carslberg Export last night, so I sounded off a bit.

It's worth bearing in mind if you buy on an execution-only basis (without advice) not writing the policy in trust is the responsibility of the policyholder.

If going the advised route, the adviser should recommend it be written in trust and document the reasons why that isn't the case if he fails to do so.

As may be apparent, I feel very strongly about this and anyone - be it a website making a sale or an adviser, there should be a strong justification for why a policy isn't being written in trust. It should be the default option however the "purchase" is made.

Beckyy

Just a quick update. I cancelled my OH's policy, although I haven't yet taken out a new one, and I have recieved a bill from the financial advisor stating that we owe him £770 for his advice (minus the £300 fees we already paid for his services for current and previous house purchases), so £470 - asking for a cheque for this amount.

I've made a thread here, and would really appreciate any advice: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4007201=