to expect parents to have life insurance as a matter of course?

[probablyoverinsured]

Is it not the first thing you think about when you first hold your newborn? How can I best care for this little one? What do I need to do/sacrifice to ensure their welfare? in any circumstances?

I appreciate you can't be insured for every eventuality, and with the best will in the world, you can think you have taken out adequate insurance, and in the event it doesn't actually pay out for some reason or other.

But it's about £2 a week, in most cases - surely this is factored into the cost of providing for a child, when you do your calculations? I expect there are a few that can't afford it, but most can.

I am just amazed to hear of someone recently, really struggling, with no life insurance payout for the children, because there was no policy.

Am I living in a fool's paradise? Don't most parents have life insurance? Am I just showing my ignorance? Why wouldn't a parent have life insurance? Do you? if not, why not?

I’m paying about £35 a month I think for life and critical illness.

Nearly ex-DH has his own similar policy.

To be honest, I think there is a difference between people who could afford it but don’t care or choose not to, and people who are already cut to the bone/using food banks.

Yes, it was the sort of thing we worried about and wanted sorted when I was pregnant. I suppose there’s a privilege in being able to afford it, but if you could afford it and don’t bother then you’re a fool.

Same as those people who have accidents abroad on luxury holidays and then have to start a Go Fund Me. But I’m the person who bought insurance for two nights in Dublin, cos better safe than sorry 😳

Ohh yawn, wind your neck in. Everyone has their own circumstances. Rest on your laurels that you have your own life insurance and keep your beak out of everyone else's. It doesn't concern you are your passive aggressive if not, why not bollox is grating. keep your own side of the yard clean.

We cannot get it. My husband is too disabled and no life insurance companies will touch him.

However, we have death in service benefit, no mortgage and substantial savings. I also work FT and am able to pay our household bills on my own.

I tend to assume that people don't have life insurance for good reason and do not judge people who cannot get it either for financial reasons or because of disability.

Looked into it. It wasn't £2 a week. They didn't like many of my health conditions. Wouldn't have been able to afford the mortgage.

I always had it linked to my mortgage, then became ill/disabled overnight and when it came up for renewal I was refused because my treatment was still ongoing (nhs wait lists mean 8 years later I'm still awaiting some treatments). I also had sickness benefits which were really helpful and critical illness cover which wasn't useful because my illness didn't conform to the list of illnesses that are critical (even though i was critical and had a life changing event). I tried more recently when I renewed my mortgage and still couldn't get any. So not all people can get insurance and not all people can afford it. I worry even if I can get insurance if I'll be able to afford it (I only have disability benefits and an ill health pension).

Our life insurance which admittedly covers critical illness too is c£180 a month for us both. Non smokers. Very lucky we can afford it - can see why people don’t have it, especially right now.

We have life insurance to cover the mortgage (£51 a month on decreasing cover for a big mortgage). I have a big death in service benefit, DH doesn't work.

Critical illness doesn't seem worth it to me when I've run the numbers. To cover the mortgage amount for the next 20 years of mortgage term (as a healthy 45 year old) would cost me £160 a month. I think I'm better off keeping increasing savings amounts. It is a tricky call though and I do worry about what would happen if I was too ill to work. Downsize massively I suppose and live on benefits.

I mean this genuinely - no insurance company I know deliberately tried to avoid paying out. The whole industry is really tightly regulated and a lot of the misconceptions are unfair.

I don't work in insurance any more so I'm not bound to defend them. But I worked in the Claims and Underwriting areas of this industry for a very long time - all the companies get together regularly to talk about how to do things better, how to make things fairer, and how to be clearer to customers.

The problem is that lots of insurance is poorly sold, and people don't really understand what they're buying, or what exclusions there are. And that's where the problems lie.

For life cover, most reputable companies won't offer exclusions because it's not fair. Exclusions would be applied for health cover - some types anyway - but for life cover, many companies would either charge a higher premium, or just decline the application. And it's for exactly the reasons you said, at least in part, because it can be very difficult to untangle whether the excluded condition contributed. It would be very contentious and time-consuming. The other reason is that the chances are that the family members wouldn't know about the exclusion because the person who took the contract out would be dead. So the family would think they were covered, only to discover they weren't - that's not a situation the industry wants to find itself in because it's generally thought to be pretty unfair to the family. So they usually - and I am generalising here - usually, won't offer exclusions on life cover. If you do a high risk job or hobby, you might have Accidental Death excluded but all other causes of death are not generally excluded. And I wouldn't recommend any life cover that does.

Those over-50 life policies are nearly always a giant rip-off. Customers often end up paying in more than is paid out. And usually, if there's a death within the first couple of years, you only get a premium refund, not the full payment.

They're extremely dodgy, as a rule.

I tried to get it but was turned down due to a combo of weight + a history of mental health issues. I’ve been mentally well for 5 years now but the broker told me to try in another 5 (and hopefully I will have lost a bit of weight by then too)

Ive been tempted by Dead Happy insurance as they just don’t insure for suicide, which means they ignore mental health stuff- ideal for me. But the price is only guaranteed for 10 years so could find myself with a chronic condition in 10 years time with no way of getting insurance. So not sure really.

My husband is insured on a basic decreasing cover for the cost of our mortgage, and I have death in service benefits so that will have to do for now

Customers often end up paying in more than is paid out.

That's the basis of all insurance products though - they need the majority to pay in more than they get out or underwriters would be bankrupt.

Looked into it. It wasn't £2 a week. They didn't like many of my health conditions. Wouldn't have been able to afford the mortgage.

That's the crux of it, isn't it? I remember a (very) old Paul Merton sketch where he was playing a community police officer and he was advising a man to buy a dummy TV to fool burglars, by swapping it with his actual TV and hiding the latter under the floor boards every time he went out. This was long before flat-screen TVs were a thing, so even more gloriously silly.

The man asked what the price of the dummy TV was and, on being told, exclaimed that it cost a lot more than his actual TV - to which the officer suggested buying the dummy TV and then hiding that under the floorboards, safe from burglars!

I've looked into it in the time since I replied on this thread - just over £100/month for us both, with some critical illness cover.

That is just a rough guide if you are young and healthy and don't smoke, obviously other factors can raise the price.

A young healthy non-smoker is one of the least likely to need life insurance so why would they prioritise it over other expenditure?

I mean this genuinely - no insurance company I know deliberately tried to avoid paying out. The whole industry is really tightly regulated and a lot of the misconceptions are unfair.

OK, maybe I was a bit scathing and unfair in how I framed it; but surely, if you have one of a number of conditions that does/can affect/spread to your whole body, they would have every right to legitimately refuse to pay out under the clear terms of the policy - you're effectively a human write-off - but still, how does that help the family of the deceased person (assuming no unequivocal steamroller-related incident)?

DH gets some sort of cover through work. I also have a work policy which costs me about £15 a month and covers my death, severe injury and I think injury of my spouse.

Does annoy me somewhat that I'm worth more dead than alive 😅considering an amazonian canoe trip... 🤔

No, it's not. Not in the same sense as the over-50s policies. In those types of life insurance, you will personally get out less than you put in - that's not the case with other types of insurance. Overall, the company will get more in premium income, but that's not because you end up paying more for your policy than you'd receive.

Surplus premium income is invested for the insurer plus there's money from policies where people stop paying halfway through so never get round to claiming, or term assurance which very often doesn't pay out at all.

People don't pay in more than is paid out in a proper life insurance policy - the over-50 policies are structured differently, hence why people end up paying more.

With term assurance people pay to be covered, just in case. In most cases they don't die while they're covered by the policy - but if they did, they'd receive a lot more than they paid in.

Whole of life insurance will pay out if you continue to pay your premiums. The amount paid in doesn't come close to the potential benefits a policy provides. There's often an investment element to whole of life policies too.

We started off with this. But it kept going up. Ended up being £50 per month for both of us. Wasn't worth it, and made us struggle a bit, so ended it. Actually wasted 3 years paying into it. You can't control how much it rises by, and you waste any money that went into it, before cancelling.

Many people don't have it. And money is relative.

To be honest you sound as if you look down on people who don't buy into your way of "doing life".
Please remember that not everyone is in agreement with or can manage to cope with the idea of complete individual responsibility for every single part of their life.
In 2023 Britain, there seems to be a type of person who idealises the individual so much so, that they pride themselves on never once having relied on another person for any task, big or small. Things they take pride in are:
Paying rent to parents from 16 through a part time job( even when it isn't needed)
Working throughout university
Not accepting any money from family
Pension worked out from first starting work.
Having completely separate bank accounts from partners and being completely financially independent, at all times, even saving for any maternity leaves.
Having a child based on career progression and not feelings or health/ age.
Downsizing at the appropriate time.
Financial planning so as to ensure care can be bought and organised at appropriate time, without asking for any help.
Now I can add, life insurance the day first child is born to the list.
I'm not saying these people are wrong, far from it, just that there is often a tendency for them to consider this the minimum to be a worthy part of society. That anyone who isn't capable of this level of organisation is somehow a burden, or anyone who doesn't agree is backward thinking.
Being seemingly in control of life is also a response to the anxiety we feel living in this modern age. Some people respond to it like you, others in other ways.

Just got a mortgage and ours is £50 p/m. You wont get one for £2 per wk! When monies tight this isnt a high priority for people. I wanted it for security of having mortgage paid if one of us dies. Touch wood!

Do you mean for life cover?

Because if so, that's what I was waffling on about to you above 😅 The life insurance companies I know won't put any exclusions on life cover because it's not fair, it's complicated and often there's no clear-cut answer.

Lots of life cover has a 12 month exclusion clause for suicide. But after the 12 months, suicide is covered. If you had a really really risky job or hobby, accidental death MIGHT be excluded - but they'd be more likely to either decline it or charge you more.

They don't put exclusions on life cover. Because dealing with that would be messy, and just awful for driving families. Usually with life cover, they'll either give it to you for whatever price they think is suitable, or they won't. No exclusions.

Driving???

That's supposed to say grieving families. My computer hates me.

yes of course, there is a huge difference between parents that look into it and decide it is not for them, maybe because of the price, or because they have death in service benefits already...

and the parents who could take it out, but have just never bothered