Many families would face significant financial pressure if a loved one became seriously ill or passed away. This is why having the right level of financial protection is essential. With proper planning, you can gain peace of mind knowing that you and your family are safeguarded against life’s uncertainties.
Why Might You Need Protection?
People typically put financial protection in place to:
- Maintain their lifestyle and continue meeting financial commitments if they’re unable to work due to accident or illness.
- Ensure their family is provided for in the event of death or a serious medical condition.
- Cover a future inheritance tax liability without needing to sell the family home.
Understanding Your Family’s Needs
To determine the right level of protection for you, I need to take time to understand your personal and family circumstances, as well as ongoing financial commitments. This allows me to identify any gaps or areas of vulnerability.
I call this “disaster planning” a process where we explore different scenarios to assess the potential impact on your family’s lifestyle, income, assets and long-term goals.
Once any risks or shortfalls are identified, I will recommend and arrange the appropriate protection to ensure your family remains financially secure, whatever the future may hold.
Insurance & Protection FAQs
Yes. Living abroad often increases financial risk due to limited state benefits, employment-linked visa and dependants often relying on a single income.
Life insurance helps ensure your family can maintain their lifestyle, repay debts, and fund education if you die.
Whole-of-life policies are a type of life insurance that last for the rest of your life, rather than for a predetermined number of years.
Term Assurance policies are a type of life insurance that provides financial protection for a predetermined number of years.
Critical illness cover pays a lump sum if you are diagnosed and continue living with a defined illness, or have to undergo certain surgical procedures. The list of conditions includes heart attacks, strokes, brain tumours, a range of cancers and degenerative diseases such as Parkinson's.
Critical illness benefits for children can also be included with many providers.
Critical Illness Cover must not be overlooked when it comes to financial planning for family and individuals. Often companies have Death In Service Cover for their employees, but unfortunately nothing for when an employee becomes critically ill and is no longer able to work.
Please check the terms and conditions of your existing policy. If this is not clear, you should speak to the insurer directly and insist on having something in writing that clarifies you are covered.
Also ensure that your address is kept up to date with the insurer at all times.
In an ideal world you need enough cover for your liabilities, financial goals and replacing income. However, in many cases this makes the insurance very expensive and sometimes unaffordable.
A good financial planner will be able to establish a sensible budget to allocate to insurance and work with you to ensure your financial priorities are covered.
Not necessarily. Many insurance policies are set up with guaranteed or fixed premiums, meaning the cost does not automatically increase each year as you age. In these cases, the price of cover is locked in at outset and can actually represent better value over time as you get older.