What to Look for in Your Next Life Insurance Review?

Eventually, they just fall into the motion of nodding their head in hopes of ending the meeting as soon as possible.

If you have the difficulty of understanding insurance product, we have a guide to basic attributes of Life Insurance which can help you understand insurance product in general:

• An insurance policy is essentially an asset. Do you leave your real estate property barren for a long time or forget the deals you have made on the stock market? Surely not! So, why the double standard for insurance?

• Key questions such as “what am I paying for?”, “am I overpaying for my Life Insurance?”, “is my insurance policy meeting my requirements?”, will have answers by the end of your insurance review.

What to look for during your insurance review:

*An example of how a Life Insurance policy would look like

To start your insurance review, simply take out the contract you have signed with the insurance company and go through the terms and conditions of the policy. Key points to take note when going through your insurance policy:

*Below we will be using some basic terms for the insurance policy, if you are not familiar with insurance product in general, here is a good guide to start off with.

1. Term Duration

   It is important to know how long your insurance policy covers you for so that it won’t catch you off guard when it expires. This is especially important in Life Insurance because if you have a term Life Insurance, it WILL expire sometime in the future. It is important to have a plan after it has expired or plan for a renewal if you wish to continue to be insured after that.

2. Insurance Cover

   Know the amount of insurance cover you will be receiving in the event of an insurance claim. Then, ask yourself “is this the amount I would want to be having if I make an insurance claim right now?” Some major life incident might have occurred and the insurance cover you required might be different from what you used to require back then.

   For example, if you have a family, you may consider that you want to increase your Life Insurance cover to insure their well-being in case anything happens to you. You might need to buy extra Life Insurance when you just bought a new house to secure your mortgage loan repayment.

   The insurance policy should be tailored to suit your needs, but your needs change as life progresses, therefore it is always important to let your insurance policy ‘progress’ together with your life!
   
   
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3. Insurance Rider

   When you purchase an insurance policy, you are most likely purchasing some insurance riders that comes along with it. Be familiar with the insurance riders in your existing insurance policy, so that you can utilize your insurance policy to its fullest.

   For example, Life Insurance policy could come with critical illness riders which allows you to make an early withdrawal of your insurance coverage.

4. Insurance Premium

   Do you think it’s really necessary to pay more for your packaged Life Insurance policies that usually termed as investment-linked? Or it’s wiser to invest your money somewhere else? Now, it is time to take a look at how much you are paying monthly for your existing insurance policy. After that, go shop around for different insurance company to see what deals they are offering compared to what you are paying. Most of the time, we will only complain that our insurance premium is too high.
   
   
   Image source: tenor

   For that, you can look for a newer insurance policy that might not exist during your purchase back then. Such insurance company uses e-policy, thus cut down in the cost of insurance agent resulting in a lower premium overall.

Things to look out for when changing policy

Now if you have found out better deals in the market or you are unhappy with your current policy and looking to terminate it, please hold on for one moment!

There are 5 important things to note:

1. Cash Value

   First thing is the cash value of your investment linked Life Insurance policy. Some policies allow you to build up cash value and use it as surrender value at the end of your policy, so you should definitely take that into account. Coming back to this investment linked option, you should consider that you might be able to get a higher return if you invest your money elsewhere and opt for basic protection with a much lower payment. 

2. Early Termination Charge

   When you terminate your insurance policy early, most likely your insurance provider will not be happy. Therefore, read your terms & conditions carefully and be prepared for early termination charge (they might be costly). To avoid repeating this mistake again, you should consider getting insurance with the renewable term without losing any cash value, as you would normally lose your cash value upon termination with your investment linked Life Insurance policy.
   
   
   Image source: imgflip

3. Higher Premium

   Many policies charge higher prices when you are older age, had just recovered from sickness or just had an occupational change. Therefore, if you are thinking to switch over to another policy to have a higher cover up to RM500,000, you should take that into account and check out those that offer a more affordable rate. Generally, if you are unhappy with your current policy, it is better to do it immediately rather than waiting around because it might get more costly as time goes by.
   
   
   Image source: imgflip

4. Simplicity

   A complicated policy does not equate to a good policy. It is always better to buy something that you can understand rather than something that is overly complicated and you have no idea how it works because if you do not even understand how the product works, how could you possibly get the most out of it?

   For Life Insurance, there are companies which will offer you a clear table of a monthly payment, insurance cover and easy to understand rider which we feel would be the perfect Life Insurance choice. Purchasing your Life Insurance online also gives you access to make changes to your policy and truly be in control in getting what you really need and what’s best for you.

5. Safekeeping Your Policy

   It is also important to safe keep your insurance policy document to ensure that it can be accessed by your family if there’s anything happened to you. So it’s important to take this into accounts and look for companies that provide digital e-policy, which is retrievable via email or online storage.

Now that you have understood what you should check for in your next insurance review, it is time to put the knowledge into use. Go through your policy slowly and change anything that you are unhappy with. If you still do not have a Life Insurance policy, you should consider getting one as it can heavily burden your loved ones if there’s anything unpredictable happened to you.

*The above article is intended for informational purposes only. Loanstreet accepts no responsibility for loss that may arise from reliance on information contained in the articles.
 

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