The over fifties life insurance plans are selling like hot cakes. They promise acceptance without medical questions and are often sponsored by mature personalities like Cilla Black and David Frost. Consumers who take out these life insurance policies could be paying much more in than their recipients will get out.

Promising a pay out on the policyholder’s death, payments start from around £7 escalating to around sixty pounds. Being sold to clients between fifty one and seventy nine the payout depends on the premium paid, gender and age when the policy begins.

Disturbingly, no information about their health is required.  Some payment plans stop after a specified amount of time, but will still be valid until the insurance policyholder passes away. In other plans the premium is taken until the holder dies, however insurance holders can put more in than they get out depending upon when they pass away.

Referring to promotions for Axa Sun Life protection plan, Richard Green of independent financial advisers CBK Colchester says ‘I can’t comprehend Nigel Havers supporting this type of insurance product. He is first-rate act, but the same cannot be said for this policy.’

The Chairman of Legal and Generals over 50’s life Cover Plan, Steven Hedges defends Havers’s role, saying he is only making people conscious of the insurance plans existence . For this particular plan there is a substantial demand. He states, ‘The draw is their affordability because of their guaranteed acceptance process and the low premiums.’

Nevertheless, you could get a better deal elsewhere purchasing regular insurance policy on similar terms ‘consumers could get three or four times as much for their money from a regular life insurance policy, in return for responding to a few questions,’ says Greg Halliday of Clarence financial services.

Not asking any medical history imposes higher premiums as these policies tempt clients with pre-existing conditions who may die before the company has covered its cost. Insurers also freeze any payouts for the first 2 or 3 years to  guard themselves. A refund of the payments made is more often than not repaid if insurance policyholder passes away from natural causes during this time.

Director of financial services at Money Supermarket, Peter Yale, admits that the price may be less for regular life assurance but usually by the time you reach your fifties, many have undergone some sort of medical condition, as a result this is why consumers are fond of the over fifties plans. Policyholders’paying in more than they ever get back is one sphere he does not agree with. ‘We put a cap on the premiums, when we assemble our plans,’ he states. This means that once policyholders have paid the sum assured their premiums stop. So it pays to search around for the cheapest life assurance quotes.

Most over-fifties policies do eventually have cut off postions, but many policyholders have paid more than necessary before they reach this point. Premiums usually stop at ninety with the LV policy and the PO running them for a set duration.

The main reason people purchase these life assurance policies is to cover funeral costs. Yet, the ultimate settlement may perhaps not be enough money. An up-front payment insurance policy could be a better option with Old Mutual funeral care offering 4 packages costing between 2,699 pounds and 3,286 pounds. This particular type of plan can be taken out for 3 years.

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At this trying time you would expect an immediate settlement by your health insurers, enabling you to concentrate on getting better premiums. Unfortunately you could receive a big shock. Most cancer patients make a complete recovery thanks to progression in medical science. In this day and age some cases are not seen as critical, so it is frightening to find out that many health and life insurance policies only settle when your condition is life insurance policy threatening or terminal.

An independent financial adviser, cautions that people ought not to presume that they will get a settlement  they have been diagnosed with a serious condition. He counsels people not to deliberate on the cost alone when taking out insurance, but to examine the small print in a private health or critical illness policy to ensure that the insurance company will settle when you need it most.

On the diagnosis of a particular condition, critical illness cover will settle a lump sum. Whereas, you will receive better quality and speed of treatment with private medical/health insurance. For instance, suitable licensed drugs maybe offered, which are not dispensed on the NHS. A spokesperson of independent advice firm Clicklife says about 17 per cent of claims fall short on protection policies and at as a rule half of those are rejected because they don’t match the criteria for a severe sickness.

An illustration of a claim, which may fail is a slow growing, localised cancer, like a non-aggressive skin cancer, since it’s not life threatening. It is often the opinionthat applications for a pay out are not successful because a pre-existing illness has not been mentioned, but actually most people don’t get a pay out since their condition is not bad enough. He adds that policies should  for severe conditions and diseases. However some cancers sound much worse than they are and in these cases you more than likely won’t get any money from traditional policies.

In the past insurers had an all or nothing attitude, but they are now beginning to offer plans with a partial or full payout. An illustration of this is PruProtect, an alternative critical illness policy from the Prudential, which links the size of the settlement to the seriousness of the condition and how much suffering it will cause. This policy does not become invalid once a demand is made but successive settlements may be decreased significantly. This feature is particularly important when the patient is diagnosed with a stage 1 or stage 2 cancer, which could become even more serious.

Just lately the life insurance quotes industry addressed the tricky issue of customer non-disclosure. The ABI has brokered a new deal, which will permit claims effected by non-disclosure to receive a full or partial settlement, which was not the case previously.

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Nothing is more disturbing in life than to be diagnosed with a critical or chronic illness. Matters are made a thousand times worse when your insurance company informs you that they will not pay out on your critical illness insurance cover or private medical policy for the Cancer or HIV you are suffering from .

You are asked to peruse sub-clause four of paragraph 328 of the small print, which informs you that you have got the  wrong form of cancer. Only tumours below the hips are covered and only the first six days of your treatment will be paid for, then it is up to you to find the money.

This situation may sound strange, but even though insurers and brokers are regulated, this type of system continues to take place. It has been a time-consuming process to freshen up the industry and to make certain that consumers get a fair deal.

Just recently Cancer Backup, a registered charity, emphasizes this problem by coordinating a huge array of mystery shopping surveys, which exposed some worrying facts about the private medical insurance companies. It found that of most of the leading insurers only HAS provided cover for cancer patients throughout the period of their illness. Only the first part of the treatment is covered by the majority of health insurance companies. Care or treatment over a longperiod of time, such as hormone replacement or chemotherapy is normally excluded.

Although insurance companies and brokers want to finance long term cover for insurance holders with chronic illnesses, they won’t always make it clear to potential clients, at the time of taking out the policy what they are covered for.

While both  Cancer Backup and Macmillan Cancer support have been in consultation with similarestablishments within the industry to raise the standard of sales practices and make the phrasing of insurance documents clearer, progress has been slow since the report was published two years ago.

Private medical insurance and critical illness cover  is usually taken out by clients who are relatively fit and healthy. Getting cancer is the last thing to cross their mind. That is why it is so vital to point out an insurance policy’s exclusions before they sign up.

A testimony of best practice for companies writing and selling medical policies has been modified recently by the  ABI, which is a welcome step in the right direction.

The trade body has now advised that insurers and providers selling these types of insurance should prepare similar case studies, which explicates the conditions when an insurance policy will or won’t be paid. Sadly insurers are not obliged to stick to this code, which is voluntary.

Although the  Association of British Insurers initiative is to be appreciated, the best way of clarifying a policy is by getting the salesperson to explicate the small print.

Nevertheless, industry jargon is in spite of everything even now being used by insurance companies to bewilder the client. For instance it is wrong to categorize cancer as an acute or chronic illness, argues Cancer Backup. On the other hand insurance companies are definite that it should go in the acute group. clients are only told about this when they make a claim.

Even though the ABI have their heart in the right place, the insurance companies can only be made to better their standards by the regulator. Improved training of call centre staff, who sell a greater part of the insurance policies, is also long overdue

More meticulous sales procedures are crucial with jargon being removed. In the end it remains the responsibility of the insurersinsurance companies to ensure that their customers fully comprehend the terms of their policies before they sign the document.

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