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Private schools - Can someone explain all the insurance thing??

14 replies

NormaSnorks · 11/06/2007 21:38

The DSs are going to a local independant school in September (in Yr 3 and Yr 1) and I have just got the 'Welcome Pack' through.

I am being offered a multitude of different insurance policies for different things, and although DH & I's immediate reaction is not to bother, I am wondering if I am missing something here.

Can someone please explain - do I REALLY need:

  • personal accident insurance for my sons (e.g. if they lose a leg they will get £100k)
    at cost £15 / year)
  • school fees refund insurance (i.e. if child is long-term sick we can get fees refunded. Cost : +3 % of fees
  • private medical insurance (just for my children) at £40 per child per year. (We don't have our own family one at the moment)

    Also it seems ridiculous, but if you want to pay school fees by Direct debit that's an additional + 2% ?

    OMG - what have we done??
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ScaryHairy · 11/06/2007 21:43

That does seem like overkill and I can't really see why those things are necessary - unless it is a particularly dangerous school!
Am a bit by the 2% DD charge - I'd send them a cheque each term instead...

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Lilymaid · 11/06/2007 21:44

School probably gets paid a fee for distributing all this stuff. The only insurance details we have ever sent (by both independent and state secondaries) was for personal/third party injuries but I expect the schools got paid for sending this out too. We paid fees by cheque, having got all the money together the week before each term started. For a secondary school 2% of £10k is £200 a year and I could use that money on other things than direct debit.

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NormaSnorks · 11/06/2007 21:45

Yes - we have no intention of paying the 2% DD fee - and it is optional. I was just surprised, as I thought it would be in THEIR interests to have DD payments?

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NormaSnorks · 11/06/2007 21:46

Lily - you're probably right about the payment for distribution thing - strangely all the insurance is from HSBC....

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Hulababy · 11/06/2007 21:46

DD goes to private school but we don't pay for any special insurance. Never been sent anything home about it either.

I think the DD thing is quite common, with the extra charge. It is because it is a scheme rather than the school dealing with it I believe. WE just oay up front, saving monthly into our own account. If you are late paying you get charged an extra 10%.

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LIZS · 11/06/2007 21:48

We have the Fees insurance (kicks in after so many consecutive days) but it is a nominal amount and Personal Accident but that is £11 ish pa. There is a surcharge to pay by credit card not sure about dd

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amicissima · 11/06/2007 22:06

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

islandofsodor · 11/06/2007 22:44

About £3 a term was added on to our fees for personal accident insurance. I crossed it out and deducted it from my cheque as we don't have personal accident insurance for ourselves in other aspects of life and if dd were to be seriously injured through negligence then the school has to have public liability.

The direct debit charge I can understand, we have to pay a surcharge for dd too as you pay monthly rather than termly, increased bank charges etc. We save into an ISA each month then withdraw it at the start of term to get around that.

We were sent school fees insurance if you lose your income etc but dh is self empployed and took out income protection & critical illness anyway.

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somersetmum · 11/06/2007 22:53

I work in a public school bursary. The reason for the dd charge in our school is that full fees are due on the first day of term. The parents that pay by dd pay in instalments and we do not receive the full fees until two months into the term. The charge has been introduced to encourage parents to pay the full fees on the day they are due. You can opt to pay the full fees on the first day of term by dd and there is no charge for this.

Re: school fees insurance, +3% sounds a little exoensive; it is only +1% at our school.

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ungratefuldaughter · 12/06/2007 09:58

perhaps they get involved in private medical insurance if they have overseas children as boarders,
at one time the routine childhood booster vaccinations were charged for at private schools so maybe this would be covered
someone once suggested that for some insurances (appliance breakdown, pet, health etc) it would be wiser just to put all the premiums you would have paid into a savings account and if you need it you have the cash sitting there and if you don't need it you still have the cash sitting there

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portonovo · 12/06/2007 11:40

I thought this was standard in many state schoools too - a few times in recent years my children have come home with letters offering personal accident insurance etc, and I know other schools do it too.

There's no pressure or even real attempt to sell it, it's just one of the multitude of letters coming home. I expect most people ignore it.

I did wonder, like someone else said, whether the schools get a small amount for distributing the letters.

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Ladymuck · 12/06/2007 11:53

We automatically have personal accident insurance built into the fees. School fee refund insurance is an optional extra.

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DominiConnor · 12/06/2007 15:33

The rule with insurance is that on average you must lose, else they would go out of business. On top of their profits, I rather suspect a rake off goes to the school, which makes it an even worse deal.

You should insure against those losses which would be catastrophic. Thus insuring the structure of your home makes sense, but if the loss will not capsize your finances, you on average will lose.

Also factor in that almost all insurance policies are inherently dishonest.
As in this example, you are not covered for 100K if DS loses a leg.
Actually what you have is a claim for up to 100K, if a long and arbitrary set of conditions are met. There will be all sorts of get outs for the insurers. All sorts of conditions that allow them not to pay.

Even if you fall 100% squarely in their conditions they won'y pay up. They will offer half, just to see if they can get away with it. They have full time lawyers on their books whose only reason for living is to find ways of denying claims, and when they can't find them., make them up.
Without wishing to be too grisly, what is a "lost leg" ? Loss of foot ? Up to the knee ?
Above the knee. Want to bet the "loss of leg" is so extreme that any event that caused it would probably not be survived in any case.

Same applies to fees insurance. The get outs are so thorough that I strongly suspect that they literally get no successful claims at all.

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Judy1234 · 13/06/2007 08:36

I have never in nearly 20 yars of being a private school parent chosen to pay for any of that. If mine are a bit ill I send them to school anyway. If they need 4 weeks off with cancer loss of school feels I can live with. I think like LadyM the accident insurance might be in the fees or has been for one or two of the children but otherwise if anything was ever extra I rejected it.

Just choose not to take it and make that clear.

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