Life insurance isn’t for you. It’s for your loved ones when you can’t be there for them. It’s to enable them to deal with the important things, not to be worrying about money.
Your life insurance could:
You can do this with our
Life and Terminal Illness Cover is a life insurance benefit that pays a lump sum benefit when you die or are diagnosed with a terminal illness – where life expectancy is less than 12 months.
There is no restriction on the use of the benefit and you set the Cover to finish after an agreed number of years.
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If you want to know more you can read our Life and Terminal Illness Cover Summary
Under current legislation and HMRC practice, benefit payable under our insurance is normally free from personal liability to income and capital gains tax, for UK residents.
However, the benefit may be subject to inheritance tax unless you put your benefit in a suitable trust. We recommend you seek professional guidance because your individual circumstances can affect your tax position. Please remember that tax rules may change in the future.
Yes - if you’re with the right insurer. Different Life was founded to make a Difference by doing good. We donate one premium a year for all our policies to partner charities to help them with their great work.
Sort of. If we set up an insurance shop then there would be a display for policies that pays on death, another one that pays you if you’ve had a serious illness, and another one that pays an income if you can’t work. We currently only sell the first type so let’s look at that.
On the policies that pay on death display you’ll find their main feature is, not surprisingly, that they pay out if you die. They pay to your estate, unless you have your policy owned by someone else or you put it in a trust, when they can pay directly to someone else.
They only pay out if you die during the policy’s life. The policy could be for a duration set at the outset such as the next 25 years, or the policy could last as long as you live, normally described as a whole life policy. We sell the set-duration type if you’re aged 18 to 55.
Some policies, like our Life with Terminal Illness Cover, will pay out early if you meet their terminal illness definition. You can then use the cover to pay for treatment or drugs, or for end-of-life experiences. However if you do so there will be less left for the original reason you bought the policy.
The amount paid could be the same at any time. This is called a level sum assured and this is what we offer. Other options are:
Policies only last as long as you pay for them, though some policies stop collecting premiums at some point. For example our whole life cover stops collecting premiums on your 90th birthday.
Some policies cover two people, paying on the first to die. They are slightly cheaper than two separate policies, but we think two policies give double the cover and it’s hard to have too much cover.
On nearly every point we’ve mentioned above there can be an additional variation or two. There are options for renewability, guaranteed insurability and divorce, there are helplines and other services, and there are premiums that are reviewable and/or pay-as-you-go. In the right situation each of these could be really useful, but in general we think they’re usually accompanied by a level of complexity and cost that most people can live without.
The cost of life insurance depends on the type of policy, your age, your health - including whether you smoke, how long the policy will last for, and the amount of cover.
Actuaries, the professionals who calculate this sort of thing, need to look ahead to estimate the chances of people claiming in the future, or the rate of interest that can be earned on the reserves set aside to make sure all future claims can be paid. This makes working in an insurer almost exciting when, like us, the cost you pay for your policy is guaranteed not to change come what may.
Usually. To increase the amount of cover you have, or to extend how long it will last, the insurer will normally ask further medical questions about your health at that point. The increased cover will be more expensive due to your increased age, and may be even more expensive or even unobtainable if your health has deteriorated. It is a good reason to not skimp on the amount of cover you buy now.
You will also normally be able to reduce the level of cover or how long it lasts, without medical questions. Insurers offering more complex life insurance with different options may also agree to change the options you select if your circumstances change.
Probably. A simple rule is that if you know when something is going to happen, then there’s no uncertainty and so no insurance. If a health condition means it’s highly likely you’ll die fairly soon then there is little uncertainty and little chance of getting life insurance.
However the life insurance market does try and cover as many people as possible. Different Life covers many health issues on our normal prices, when other insurers would increase their premiums. For the most serious conditions we use the services of a specialist intermediary to ensure that you still get the best service possible.
Some insurers will ask how your parents and close relatives died, or whether they had any serious illnesses. They may then increase your premiums, or even refuse to cover you.
Different Life only asks about you. Not your parents. Not other close relatives. Only you.
Not necessarily, though it depends who you want cover from. We will cover you based entirely on what you tell us, which is why it’s important for you to always tell us the truth. In a few cases where we cannot offer you cover we will introduce you to a specialist, who may recommend an insurer that does require medical evidence.
Other insurers have different requirements. This may be to see your medical records, or to have you examined by a nurse or a doctor. They are more likely to ask for further evidence if you have told them of a medical condition, you have asked to be covered for a large amount, or you are older.