Moneysworth wins Best Small Protection Advice Firm 2023! Learn more

Skip to main content Accessibility icon Accessibility

News & Views

We’ll be heading to London this week for the prestigious Health Insurance Intermediary Awards where we’re finalists in two categories.

We’ve made the shortlist in the following categories:

  • Best Intermediary for High Net Worth Clients
  • Best Protection Intermediary

As an intermediary specialising in helping those who may be considered high risk for insurance, we’re delighted to feature in these shortlists against some great competition.

The awards will be taking place at London’s Grosvenor House on Thursday 15th October 2015 with over 900 industry professionals and experts expected to be there.

Wish us luck!

Obtaining Critical Illness cover for anyone with Type 2 Diabetes can be very difficult, but it is possible in some circumstances, as one of our recent cases demonstrates.
The first problem is that most insurance companies will automatically decline any application for Critical Illness cover from a person with Type 2 diabetes, irrespective of positive factors, such as good control and lack of complications. So it’s difficult for consumers to know where to go.
Normally buying life insurance and critical illness cover can be done in many places like the bank, large comparison websites and financial advisers, however if your personal circumstances mean that you do not fit the standard mould, you would be well advised to use the services of a life insurance broker who has particular specialisation in dealing with people who have health conditions.
Moneysworth has been successful in arranging Life and Critical Illness cover on a number of occasions for people with Type 2 Diabetes, as a recent case demonstrates.
A gentleman in his early 40’s made an enquiry on our website: www.moneysworth.co.uk. Type 2 Diabetes had relatively recently been diagnosed, his control was good and he didn’t have any diabetic complications, but he was overweight. With a raised BMI (Body Mass Index) of 31, this made finding cover even more difficult. He wanted Life and Critical Illness cover and had a specific budget in mind for his premiums of £75 per month.
As we do in all cases, we researched the whole market for the client to see if life and critical illness cover would be available. Our research indicated that only one insurance company would offer him cover, so we applied to them. The insurer wrote to his GP surgery for further medical information and on receipt of that offered a guaranteed premium policy for £75 per month, covering the client for Level Life or Critical Illness cover (without exclusions) of £75,350 over 23 years.
People with an existing health condition who have been declined elsewhere should not give up hope of getting the cover they want until they have used the services of a specialist life insurance broker. If a client wants to find out what might be available and apply, Moneysworth do not charge a fee. This means Moneysworth is only paid a commission by an insurer if we are successful. Remember if you’re unsure if a broker is a specialist, you could ask the question: ‘What percentage of your clients have pre-existing health conditions?’. At Moneysworth that figure is over 75%!

Hello and Welcome!

We are proud to launch our new website which with a great deal of consideration, has taken over a year to develop.

The new site is very different to the old one and we thought it might be useful to explain some of the thinking that has gone into the design and content.

Firstly we were aware that our website had not kept pace with the changes in our business and especially our client groups. Put simply any visitor to the old site might well conclude that our life cover services were designed only for people with pre existing health conditions. However the truth is that we arrange life cover for a much wider range of clients, including people with no health conditions, business owners and clients with occupational and/or overseas travel issues.

Secondly we knew that the old website looked dated and the new site needed a much fresher approach. Financial services websites generally are often criticised for being somewhat dull, so it was important to us that visitors find the new site visually stimulating and engaging.

Our clients receive a bespoke personal service and we wanted the new website to visually send a clear message to visitors, that we are different. We have tried hard to make the site easy to read and visually engaging by breaking information down into manageable amounts. We have used space to de-clutter and chosen a font which feels personable (and different again) and is easier on the eye.

Functionality was another key consideration. We have tried to make the new website easy to navigate and as simple to use as possible. We have tried to make it easy for customers to communicate with us, whether making an enquiry or asking us any questions (e.g. email, phone, live chat). It’s really easy for visitors to share a link to any page they think may be of interest with a friend. Underlying all of this is a clear invitation for visitors to engage with us.

Finally we wanted to create a website that visitors find genuinely useful and compelling. In short we want people to leave our site feeling their visit has been worthwhile and the key issue here is the quality of the content.

Here we have tried as much as possible to put ourselves in the shoes of our clients. We asked ourselves time and time again ‘what are the questions that customers really want answers to?’ ‘How are customers feeling as they approach applying for life insurance?’ ‘What concerns do they have?’ ‘What information might help customers feel more confident’? For example, some people with pre-existing health conditions may fear that life insurance premium rates would be completely unaffordable in their particular situation. They may fear the embarrassment explaining that it was unaffordable. For some these potential negative outcomes might cause them to avoid making any enquiry at all. It is for this reason that we have decided to include a selection of real cases, showing actual premium and cover amounts achieved for some of our customers on the diabetes and heart condition pages of the site. Throughout the website we have similarly tried to include lots of additional information which we think visitors might find useful.

When it comes to life insurance, we believe that what customers are looking for above all, is to feel confident in the decisions they are making. We hope you find our website of genuine value and we look forward to being of service.

Whether you have diabetes or whether you are concerned about the possibility of being diagnosed with diabetes in the future you should take a minute to review your life cover. If you need more than its probably a good idea to act sooner rather than later.

Here’s why.

Currently Diabetic? – Once you have started your life cover, the terms (including the premium amounts) are generally guaranteed for the rest of the policy providing that continue to pay your premiums, irrespective of future changes in your health. Delaying taking out cover will generally end up costing you more money when you take out cover at a later date because you will be older. It may also cost you more because of the progress of your diabetes, especially if you develop more complications such as retinopathy, neuropathy or kidney issues. So again arranging your cover now protects you from the effects that future changes are likely to have if you delay. Worse still some future health developments could mean that it becomes impossible to be able to obtain life insurance. One highly relevant example of this would be the future development of any heart issues which is a significant additional risk factor for diabetics. Unfortunately no mainstream insurance companies will offer life cover to any diabetic, type 1 or type 2, who also then goes on to develop a condition such as angina or who has a heart attack. However the life insurance policy terms for those diabetics who arranged their life cover before they developed any heart conditions are still guaranteed, which also means that if death accours as a result of a heart attack you are still covered.

Not Currently Diabetic But Worried About Being Diagnosed With Diabetes In The Future?
You would also be well advised to review your life cover now rather than later. Now you may still be able to obatin life cover at lower premium rates and in the absence of any significant existing health factors there is a good chance that you may be able to so at ‘normal’ premium rates, which are the cheapest premium rates. Again if you take out the cover now these premium rates are generally guaranateed. If you delay sorting out your cover until you are diagnosed with diabetes, expect to pay higher premiums and in some cases much higher premium rates. Also if you delay until you are diagnosed you should expect to experience difficulty in being able to arrange some other valuable benefits, for example critical illness cover. This could mean for example if the purpose of the life insurance is pay off a mortgage that the option to include insurance to pay off the mortgage if you have a heart attack is simply no longer available to you even though the risk of it happening has increased.

I have been trying to get my ahead around some statistics that I came across yesterday.

Sainsbury’s commissioned the research looking at how many people in the UK had mortgages with no life cover in place to repay the outstanding balance. The results show some surprisingly big numbers, much bigger than most would perhaps guess.

Firstly the total figure of  mortgages without life cover is given at £245,000,000,000 – thats a quarter of a trillion. But  ‘billions’ and ‘trillions’ are everyday newspeak terms now, over used by both politicians and news reporters these words have become a sort of TV litter which we therefore tend to ignore as part of the familiar landscape.

Dig a bit deeper into the Sainsbury report figures though and we start to find more meaningful statistics.

The number of people with no life insurance to cover their mortgages? Just under 7 Million, or to put in a more meaningful way  that equals just over 4 in every 10 mortgages. The report goes on to break down this figure between different age bands, as follows

Age       Percentage of mortgage holders unprotected
18-24    62%
25-34    38%
35-44    33%
45-54    30%
55-64    55%
65+       58%

Of course within these figures there will be mortgage holders who have valid reasons for not having life cover. The biggest such group will be single people with no dependants – fair enough. Another group might those with significant personal wealth.

But what about all the others? What about the significant majority who are not particularly wealthy but who do have dependent partners and/or families? What about the growing number of older people who find themselves with mortgages much later in life than they had originally anticipated? What are the reasons why these mortgage holders choose to have no life cover?

Here are some of the common reasons people give when asked.

”I’ve never really thought about it.” –

”Its a waste of money – its  (my death) will probably never happen ”

”Its too expensive – I can’t afford it”

”No one will insure me with my health conditions”

All of these responses deserve a fuller response which is probably worth addressing in future posts and it would be good to hear readers opinions, so if you have one please comment.

But for the moment I should mention one other factor which I suspect lurks in the background for many and that is fear. Fear is a great inhibitor in all aspects of life. Fear changes our behaviour, it makes us more cautious, it makes us avoid action, fear makes us hide.

Generally people tend to fear the unknown. I am not a professional psychologist but based on my own observations fear is especially to do with a future outcome that is not known. Often the reason why people don’t face up to their fears is because they are scared as to what the outcome might be if they do. By avoiding action we feel like we are keeping the possible undesired future outcome at bay. Mostly its a subconcious kind of response.

So how does ‘fear’ apply to this issue of life cover for mortgages?

Perhaps underneath these figures many people are frightened about the questions they may be asked if they do apply for life cover. Perhaps they are frightened of having to reveal ’embarassing’ personal medical information about themselves.

Or perhaps they fear the final outcome  – the fear that if they apply they they might get turned down and  all that that might mean. For example it could confirm their own worst fears that they are going to die sooner rather than later, or in some way mark their financial credit record making it more difficult for them to borrow money in the future if they applied for a loan or mortgage. So some people might choose to avoid applying for life cover in order to avoid some sort of final judgement which they fear might finally mark their cards for good.

But of course fearing something does not mean that it is going to happen.

The problem is that many people are needlessly putting their families at risk by continuing to take no action. Put bluntly if you have no life cover for your mortgage on your family home then your home is at risk.  If you have a family you owe it to your family to seek the appropriate life insurance in order to protect the family home for them.

Of course this for many will involve confronting a fear of the unknown.

But if only people with such fears knew where to look they might be quite surprised at the outcome. Here at www.moneysworth.co.uk we offer a specialist service for people with pre existing health conditions who are seeking life cover, for mortgages or for family protection (for other reasons too). Our service is confidential and non judgemental. We have over a number of years developed and refined a process which is designed to help customers find best outcomes. Each case is indivually researched. Further more our service is fee free to our customers and is with no obligation. Therefore it costs nothing to try.

The results are very encouraging. It should be said that we are not able to offer all customers a 100% guarantee that we will be able to find the life cover that they seek but we are able to help the majority, many of whom have been turned down elsewhere before coming to us. Very often the premiums acheived are considerably less than the customer originally feared.

Customers frequently express a high level of satisfaction with our service and often say that a great weight has been lifted for them. With the peace of mind knowing that their dependants are now protected they no longer need to live in fear.

How soon can someone apply for life insurance after suffering a heart attack?

This is a question we are often asked as we receive an increasing amount of enquiries from people who have suffered a heart attack (myocardial infarction). For those affected it is not surprising that their minds should turn to this subject. For having survived a heart attack we are normally given a little while to recover and for many this provides time to consider what the future might hold, especially for our familes and those who financially depend upon us.

For some it can be worrying to realise that they have insufficient life cover to repay the outstanding balance on the mortgage. This means that in the event of their death, amidst and that that would mean to their nearest and dearest, the family home may be at risk as well!

The mind then turns to questions about how difficult it might be to obtain life insurance following a heart attack and how long it might take to arrange for cover to be in place…………..

Well generally speaking the prospects are often better than might at first be assumed.

Firstly if you were over the age of 40 at the time of your heart attack and you have only had one heart attack there is a good chance that you will be able to obtain life insurance. However if your heart attack was severe or if you have further health conditions (eg diabetes) then you may find it difficult to obtain life cover.

Just how long it will take to obtain life cover after your heart attack will vary from one insurance company to another. Generally speaking most life insurance companies will be prepared to offer you cover twelve months after the heart attack and some will even consider offering terms six months.

It may even be possible to do even better than that! We know one or two life companies who may consider applications one month after the client suffering a heart attack, depending on the overall picture.

So if you, or someone you know, has recently suffered a heart attack, if you are worried that you have insufficient life cover in place to sufficiently protect your family, if you think its probably too late to get life cover……… don’t despair. It might be easier to get life cover than you think.