Life Insurance
Life Insurance can be defined as a contract between an insurance policy holder and an insurance company, where the insurer promises to pay a sum of money in exchange for a premium, upon the death of an insured person or after a set period.
Based on the arrangement, in the event of the death of the policyholder or, if the policy matures, the insurance provider shall pay the person or his family a lump sum amount, after a certain amount of time. There are different types of life insurance policies to suit the individual needs and requirements of the policy buyers.
Why Life Insurance ?
Life Insurance is a financial cover for a contingency linked with human life, like death, disability, accident, retirement etc. Human life is subject to risks of death and disability due to natural and accidental causes. When human life is lost or a person is disabled permanently or temporarily, there is loss of income to the household.
Life Insurance is needed :
- To ensure that your immediate family has some financial support in the event of your demise
- To finance your children’s education and other needs
- To have a savings plan for the future so that you have a constant source of income after retirement
- To ensure that you have extra income when your earnings are reduced due to serious illness or accident
- To provide for other financial contingencies and life style requirements
What is Term Insurance?
Life insurance policy that provides financial coverage for a specific tenure .The term plan provides financial protection to the beneficiary of the policy incase of the unfortunate demise of the life assured during the policy tenure. A term plan not only offers financial security to your family but also is capable of fulfilling its future needs such as your child’s higher education, child’s marriage, etc. Among all the life insurance products, Term life insurance offers the highest life coverage for the minimum premiums during the term of the policy.
Types of Life Insurance Plans
Term Insurance Plans
It takes care of any medical emergencies that could occur to your health during the travel. There may be a health injury, illness or accident that requires an immediate medical attention. A domestic travel insurance policy provides a cover against medical expenses, when you are travelling. Any medical expenses incurred due to an immediate medical treatment of an injury sustained is also covered.
Whole Life Plan
The whole life plan is an insurance plan which covers your life against the risk of “dying too early” and “living too long” both, as the life cover is provided for the whole life keeping maximum maturity age as 100 in most of the plans. This insurance company pays the policy proceeds to your nominee in the event of your death during a policy term, but if you survive till the maximum maturity age, the company will provide the maturity benefit as well.
Endowment Plan
Endowment plan comes with the component of saving and insurance making it a twin benefit plan under the policy. Endowment plans offer lump sum payout in the event of death or maturity, whichever happens first. This life insurance plan can be opted to ensure a robust corpus and regular savings to meet financial objectives in the future.
Money Back Plan
This policy offers a portion of the sum assured payout on regular intervals during the policy term in terms of money backs or survival benefits, while the insured is alive. Once the insured survives through the entire policy term, the remaining sum assured is paid back as maturity benefit. In case the insured dies during the term of the policy, apart from the money backs, the lump sum payout is given to the nominee also known as survival benefits.
Child Plans
Child plans are a type of life insurance plans, which are taken with a specific objective of giving unperturbed financial support to the child in terms of education, higher education, marriage, etc. Child plans also offer death and maturity benefits (whichever happens earlier). Usually, such plans come with an inbuilt waiver of premium benefit to continue the policy to ensure coverage for your child.
ULIPS
ULIPs (Unit Linked Insurance Plans) provide the twin benefit of insurance and investment opportunities under one umbrella. ULIPs are linked to the market, and the insured’s money is invested in various funds (based on equities, debts, government bonds) as per the risk-taking capacity of the insured. The lump-sum payout is given to the nominee in the event of death, and the entire value of the fund is given to the insured if he survives the policy term.
Pension Plan
Such plans cover the risk of ‘Living too Long’. Pension plans enable to survive the same lifestyle and allow financial independence after the retirement age. Regular payment of premiums builds a financial corpus, which can be withdrawn partly and the remaining can be utilized to provide pensions to the insured as stated in the policy.
What are the Benefits of Buying Term Insurance Plan?
- Safety for Loans and Liabilities
- Cover Critical illness
- Higher Sum Assured at Affordable Premiums
- Tax Benefits
- Support in the case of Disability
- Death Benefits
- Maturity Benefits
- Survival Benefits
- Rider Benefits
Term insurance also aids in providing safety for the dependents from your fiscal liabilities such as loans or any other debts that you have.
Together with offering life cover, a term insurance plan also offers protection against critical illness. For a tiny add-on premium amount, Critical Illness cover offers lump sum payment when any critical illness such as kidney failure, cancer, or heart attack, etc. is first detected. Online Term Insurance Plan also takes care of family in case of your disability or critical illness.
One of the most alluring features of a term insurance plan is that the premiums are always the lowest, unlike the other life insurance products. Moreover, the sum assured offered under term plan is relatively higher when compared to the premium amounts. Regular term insurance plan, including TROP Plan, come with a 105% return on the premium benefit when the policy matures.
Term insurance plan comes loaded with tax benefits on the term policy premiums paid. New-age term insurance Plan along with critical illness cover also provide some additional tax benefits on the premiums paid by the policyholder. One can also avail benefits subject to the conditions u/s 10(10D) on the amount that his/her family receives in the case of an untimely demise or unfortunate event.
In some of the term plans, the insurance provider pays the future premiums in the case of permanent or total disability. Consequently, the policyholder’s life insurance cover continues even if s/he is not able to make payment of the premiums.
On the demise of the life assured during the tenure of the policy, the nominee/ beneficiary of the policy receives the total death benefit chosen at the time of commencement. Depending on the type of term insurance plan, the death benefit may stay the same over the whole tenure of the plan (standard term Plan), decrease (decreasing term Plan) or increase (increasing term Plan). The insurers provide various options of payment for the term insurance plan. These include a lump sum payment, lump-sum payment plus an annuity that may be monthly, quarterly or yearly, or simply annuities that are spread over the agreed number of years.
Term insurance plans don't come with any survival or maturity benefits. If one wants maturity benefits, then a TROP (Term Return of Premium) plan is suggested.
Survival benefit is the amount a policyholder receives at the end of a policy term. In case, you survive till the end of your policy and the policy is active, it will take care of your financial needs by offering survival benefits.
With your Life Insurance plan, you may opt for additional coverage or riders like Accidental Death Benefit, Disability rider, Income benefit rider, Critical Illness rider, etc. to give you added protection along with your base policy.
Major Exclusions
- Suicide
- Any health condition or ailment that has been suffered by the life insured/were diagnosed/or receiving treatment within 48hrs before the policy intimation date .
- No critical illness rider benefit is offered by the term plan in case of invasion, war, the act of a foreign enemy, civil war, revolution, rebellion, strike, mutiny, etc.
- Term Plan does not offer any critical illness rider coverage in case of involvement of the life insured in extreme and risky sports activity such as scuba diving, bungee jumping, trekking, rock climbing, paragliding, skydiving, water sports activity, etc.
- Term Plans do not offer any critical illness rider in case of sexually transmitted diseases such as AIDS/HIV, the claim made by the beneficiary of the policy is rejected by the insurance company.
- The term insurance company does not provide any critical illness rider in case of any casualty resulting from the involvement of law violation or unlawful activities. The beneficiary of the policy will be eligible for the claim only in case it is a sudden and unintentional act.
Add on Cover/Rider with Life Insurance Policy?
Accidental Death Benefit Rider
An additional death benefit is paid to your nominee apart from the base policy payout. The nominated beneficiary/ nominee can receive term rider sum assured if you have taken this rider to your base policy.
Term Rider
An additional death benefit is paid to your nominee apart from the base policy payout. The nominated beneficiary/ nominee can receive term rider sum assured if you have taken this rider to your base policy.
Critical Illness Rider
There are severe illnesses which disable an individual temporarily or permanently resulting in loss of earnings. The treatment cost of such illnesses is massive due to medical cost inflation. You can choose a critical illness rider to take care of the medical cost involved in such illnesses like Heart attack, Cancer, Paralysis, Coronary artery bypass surgery, Major organ transplant and many more.
Waiver of Premium Rider
As the name suggests, the future premiums are waived off in the events like death or disability of the insured or policyholder as per the policy contract. The policy continues to survive till the end with the waiver of future premiums.
Income Benefit Rider
Life Insurance benefits are usually given to the nominee/s as a one-time lump sum, and income benefit rider allows your nominee to receive the policy benefits in installments as a regular income. This rider allows you to regulate the dispersal plan of policy proceeds that suits best for your family in your absence.
Disability Rider
Disability rider replaces your income for the specified tenure in the event of permanent or temporary total or partial disability due to an accident. The payout varies with the kind of disability occurred and also basis the insurer’s rider conditions. In case of total disability, the payout is the full sum assured whereas, in case of partial disability, the payout is the partial sum assured.
Term Insurance Claim Process in the Event of Death
- Intimation :
- Go to the nearest branch office of the insurance company. Or
- call the toll-free number of insurance providers for intimating. Or
- E-mail the insurance provider for claim intimation email id provided.
- Document required in case of natural death
- Documents of term insurance policy
- Copy or original death certificate of the life insured.
- Duly filled and signed the claim form.
- Statement of the claimant
- Any other documents as required by the insurance company.
- Document required in case of accidental death
- Police investigation report, police FIR report
- Medical reports and hospital certificates including the discharge and admission summary of the policyholder, test reports, death summary, etc.
- Statement of attending doctor/s, certificate released from the medical attendant.
- Report of post mortem
- Statement of the claimant
- Any other relevant documents as asked by the insurance provider.
First Process is intimation to the insurance co.