With the population now living longer than ever before, many of us will unfortunately suffer from or be diagnosed with a critical illness at some point in our lives. However, with the advances of medical science, more and more of us are now surviving these illnesses.
This is where Critical illness insurance becomes important because where life insurance covers you in case you die, it will not cover you should you, for example, have a heart attack, stroke, brain tumor or be diagnosed with cancer and survive. These illnesses can severely compromise your income and may force you out of work and remove your income all together.
Critical illness insurance is a product, designed to give you peace of mind through a lump sum cash payment if the policyholder is diagnosed with one of many illnesses listed on the policy. More illnesses are now covered than ever before.
The UK insurance market is very highly regulated for the protection of consumers. The standardisation of the claims definitions may serve many purposes including increased clarity of cover for policyholders and greater comparability of policies from different life offices. For example, in the UK the Association of British Insurers (ABI) has issued a Statement of Best Practise which includes a number of standard definitions for common critical illnesses.
With a critical illness cover policy in place, you will receive payments to settle any debts, mortgage etc and should you need any modifications applying to your home such as a stair lift etc then this can also be funded by your policy. This eases the financial burden of getting ill, reducing additional stress and allowing the patient to focus on getting better.
Many life insurance policies have the option of Critical illness cover at little extra cost so this is always worth considering when shopping for life insurance. If you already have a life insurance policy than you should enquire about critical illness insurance as you may be able to simply add it to your existing life insurance policy.
