Unit-Link Insurance Would Be the Best Choice for Busy People

Some financial consultants would advice you to separately buy an insurance policy and invest your money. That will work great if you have enough time to monitor the portofolios you manage or get managed by your investment manager. Still, in case you do not want to be bothere by such a complicated thing, then you'd better choose the unit-linked insurance plan (ULIP) as to cover both health protection and investment. 

The basic concept of this insurance is that any time a customer pays the premium, they actually pay the health and life protection as well as their investment. The proportion of the health protection and investments are arranged before the proposal signed. 

As a prospective customer, what you need to do is to understand the proposal in detail, especially the health cover you will have. Dealing with the health protection, at least you have to posses the following important coverage:

1. Basic insurance

Basic insurance is the premium allocated for the death and/or disablement condition a customer may be risky in the future. The amount of this basic allocation is on your own. You'd better ask the agent to explain how much coverage, the premium to pay, and the limit of age coverage. 

2. Crisis cover

Crisis cover deals with the severe illness a customer suffer, such as cancer, stroke, coma, and other critical illness. Make it sure whether you, as a prospective customer will have the early stage crisis cover. This is importance because most of crisis cover will only cover you if you have the advance stage of illness. In fat, the early stage crisis cover will cover your illness starting from the early stage or early detection, that you will have a great chance to be recover from such critical illness. The early crisis cover will allow the policy holder to claim anytime they are detected to suffer from the critical illness. 

3. Personal accident death and disablement cover

This part of cover deals with the cover for death and/or disablement caused by an accident. The insurance company will pay the policy holder in case the policy holder get an accident, either died or disabled. The maximum coverage of age will be listed on the proposal, then ask the agent to explain it clearly.

4. Hospital and surgerical coverage

This is extremely important for you to have the cover because it could takes you such expensive money of being hospitalized. The company has certain plans and limit for each plan for  you to choose. The higher plan you choose, the higher premium you have to pay. In fact, some company will include such items as the room cover, medicines, and some others. Ask the agent to explain them clearly.

5. Payor cover 

Payor deals with the premium paid by the insurance company for you in case you have a certain crisis illness. Make it sure whether the payor is for the waiver only - the premium for protection - or for both the protection as well as the investment. 

There are perhaps some other coverage an insurance company offer, but those five covers are the basic ones you need to possess dealing with the life and health protection. Be wise in proposing each of the coverage.

Then, the next thing you have to understand is the portofolio(s) you will have dealing with the money invested along with the premium you pay. There are at least three kinds of portofolio allocation you could choose: either single kind of portofolio or mixed of them. 

The kinds of portofolio to understand - perhaps, insurance companies will have different terms of portofolio for one to another. In fact, there are three kinds of them:

1. Cash fund

This kind of fund has the lowest risk as well as lowest investment yield. It sometimes sometimes will be a little higher return on investment than the deposit rate in the banks. This fund will be invested in deposit at most and a little part of them will be in stocks. This portofolio is suitable for those who invest the money in a short time (less than 5 years).

2. Managed fund

Managed fund is a portofolio a customer could choose as their investment. It consist of an event mixture of cash fund and equity fund. This investment is suitable for those who invest their money in moderate and long time. 

3. Equity fund

This kind of portofolio is a portofolio where the money invested most in stocks. This is suitable for those who intend their investment for a long period of time (more than 10 years).

Unit-link insurance plan is best for the busy people who have no time for manage both the health protection as well as investment.  

5 Smart Self Questions Before Choosing the Appropriate Life Insurance

Choosing life insurance seems like an easy way to do. In fact, there are some factors you have to consider before choosing the right life insurance for you. You may ignore the factors, but you might regret to do this later.

As a Financial Service Consultant of Prudential Life Assurance (Jackson Life Assurance in the USA), I do suggest you to consider the following before deciding to sign up the proposal your agent provide you, ask the following questions to yourself.

1.  Why do I need a life insurance?

This is a very basic question a prospective client has to ask to his/herself before deciding to buy a policy. A life protection is actually needed by anyone, no matter the condition, the health condition, the profession. The higher the risk you have, the more urgent you need to have a life insurance. 

2.  What products do I need?

For those who new to life insurance, they will find themselves difficult in deciding the products they actually need. All insurance companies offer such lucrative lures as the cover provided, the benefits, the easy way of claiming, the customer support, etc. Your insurance agent will explain you in such an interesting way but you have to focus on the questions, "what products do I need?"

There are a lot of insurance products you can choose based on your need, both for traditional and unit-linked insurance, such as basic insurance (for death and/or  disablement), early stage crisis cover, crisis cover, income cover, hospital cover, accident care cover, waiver payor, etc. Ask you agent or financial service consultant to clearly explain in detail all about them. 

Do not buy the products you do not actually need a lot. 

3.  How long will I take the insurance covers? 

After you decide what insurance products you buy, next is to think of the length of period of coverage. As I have explained at the  understanding the basic concept of insurance, decide first whether you choose buy either the traditional insurance or unit-linked insurance. Each of them has their own advantages and disadvantages. The main difference of them is the period time you have to pay the premium: you have to pay all your life time to cover your need all the time if you choose the traditional insurance, and you need only to pay in a certain period of time if you choose unit-linked insurance in order to be lifetime protected. Make it sure by asking the clear explanation about the period of coverage you will get in case you choose either traditional or unit-link insurance.

4.  Could I afford the insurance covers? 

This question deals with your money. Be wise in terms of spending money on this. Just pay what you actually need the coverage. You again your agent might  persuade you to buy all protection products the company has as the more money you pay for the premium, the higher commission will the agent earn.

Some professional financial consultant advice people to spend not more than 30% of their income. Never spend more than that amount of money as you will find difficulties in paying the due date in case you need fresh money for non-coverage incidence.

5.  Are there any comparisons I can learn from other insurance companies? 

Each company has a certain standard in paying the claims as well as determining the minimum and maximum coverage a customer may apply for. Find out comparisons first first before deciding signing the proposal provided by your agent.

This also include the procedures of claiming, facilities provided, as well as the services provided by the company by surfing through the internet or by inquiring others whose different insurance policis.

Based on the five self-questions above, you have to be wise and selective before paying the life insurance offer by a certain insurance company. 

Happy insuring!

Insurance Quotes:The Estimated Rate You Will afford with A Potential Life Insurance

Insurance quotes are estimated rate you afford with a potential insurance carrier. The insurance quotes are subject to change based on how much information you provide at the time of the quote. The more information, you provide, the more accurate your insurance quote will be.

Dealing with your life insurance, how long does it take to get a life insurance quote?

It does not take a lot of time to get a single quote. In a matter of fact, there are some factors that affect the time it takes to get an insurance quote. At least, there are 7 factors affect the time it takes to get an life insurance quote:

1. Age

The number of factor behind the life insurance premium to pay is the age of the policy holder. The older the age of policy holder, the higher rate they have to pay. That's why it is important for you to set your life insurance as young as possible, but of course, as you do not have any financial problem in terms of paying the premium. Still, it does not mean that you have to buy your life insurance policy right after college. 

2. Gender

Gender is at the second position of life insurance quotes. Woman will have to pay cheaper with the same life insurance benefits compared with man. It is because, according to the statistic research the life expectation of women is five years longer than men. 

3. Smoker

Smoking is the highest risk in terms of all kinds of causes of death and critical diseases. Smoking will risk you with a lung cancer that in turn will risk you to die faster than the non smoker. Because of this high risky habit, the life insurance company will quote smoker higher than the non smokers, and even twice. Then, how to trick it out? Just quit smoking two years before applying for a new policy.

4. Health condition 

An insurance agent as the first underwriting processor will ask you to provide them any information dealing with the health condition you have - the critical illness you have had. What you have to do is just be honest for what you have or what you feel. It is because the information will deal with the quote you will rate as well as the claims you will propose later. There will be in time you need to have a medical check up for your blood pressure for example, in case the the first underwriting processor think you should to.

5. Lifestyle

Your hobbies are also included in lifestyle. The risky hobby, such as racing cars or climbing mountain, will end up with the higher quote you have to pay. You must be honest about the lifestyle you have since, for example you don't let the insurance agent know that you have a racing car hobby and next time you claim for the accident caused by such a hobby, the insurance company will deny your claim. 

6. Family medical story

Family medical story deal with your insurance quotes in which the agent will ask you about your parents or siblings's health condition, whether they have experienced such critical illness, like cancer stroke, heart attacks and other critical illnesses, including premature death. This medical story will impact on some higher premium to pay.

7. Driving habits

Not all life insurances will pay such an attention on this aspect, but some will. Whether the insurance companies ask about violations on the application, they can access Department of Motor Vehicles records to find out if you have run afoul of the traffic laws. If you have good driving habits, the life insurance companies likely rate you with a more favorable premium. 

Those 7 factors affecting the quote of rate you will pay needs to pay your attention at. In fact, just as important is whether or not the quote has the coverage you need and want, when you are getting quotes on life insurance, you should have each company run the quote a similarly as possible. It is the only way you will know which carrier has the best price for you.

Understanding the Basic Concept of Life Insurance Before Applying for A Policy

Life insurance is now a primary need for people in advanced countries and it has been now becoming a new life style there. People in such countries are aware of the importance of this insurance in which it protects themselves as well as protect their income. And todays, life insurance becomes more familiar in developing countries. And as this, all insurance companies compete to provide the best services to both the existing customers as well prospective customers. Besides, they keep innovating their products to meet the customers's needs. 

A decade ago or so, all insurance companies provide the customers with traditional products that is called term life insurance. And since then, some companies have been innovating their products into the more beneficial ones: unit-linked insurance. 

Traditional insurance consists of three types: term-life insurance, whole-life insurance, and endowment insurance. 

a. Term life insurance

This type of insurance provides the customers a life protection in a certain period of time. This kind of insurance requires the customers to pay a lower rate with higher cover. In case the customer gets incidence where they got into fatal accident (disabled) or pass away, the company pays all the cover put on the policy either to customer or the beneficiary. But, in case, the contract of the term life ends while there is no incidence or claim during until the contract ends, there is no premium return to the customers. The premium of this kind of insurance is usually paid annually.  

b. Whole life insurance 

This kind of insurance is the opposite type of term life insurance. In this type of insurance, you need to pay higher than the term life but the company will pay you back some or the whole premium paid in case you as the customer do not claim anything during the period of protection. This kind of insurance take longer than the term life insurance. 

c. Endowment insurance 

Endowment insurance is more popular than the first two kinds o insurance. The customers will not only get the returning premium paid at the end of the contract, they will also receive some amount of money before the contract ends. Education insurance is included in this kind of traditional insurance. 

Unit-link insurance or is commonly called as unit-linked insurance plan (ULIP) is a product offered by insurance companies that unlike a pure insurance policy gives investors the benefits of both insurance and investment under a single integrated plan. This kind of insurance product was firstly introduced in India in 1971 by Unit Trust of India. 

A unit-linked insurance plan is basically a combination of insurance as well as investment. A part of the premium paid is utilized to provide insurance cover to the policy holder while the remaining portion is invested in various equity and debt schemes. 

The money collected by the insurance provider is utilized to form a pool of fund that is used to invest in various markets instruments (cash, managed, and equity funds) in varying proportions just the way it is done for mutual funds. Policy holders have the option of selecting the type of funds based on their investment need and appetite. 

Just the way it is for mutual funds, ULIP policy holders are also allotted units and each unit has a net asset value (NAV) that is declared on a daily basis. The NAV is the value based on which the net rate of returns on ULIPs are determined. The NAV varies from one ULIP to another based on market conditions and the fund’s performance. 

Both the traditional and unit-link insurances have their own advantages and disadvantages. Just be wise in terms of choosing the suitable one for your needs as well as your financial condition. In case you need a certain short period of time protection, it would be wise for you to choose the term-life insurance. In fact, if you need longer protection as well as need to prepare the future financial planning, you'd better to choose the second one, unit-link insurance.