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News & Views

For almost twenty years, Moneysworth has been committed to providing value to our clients.

Our process focuses on researching each client’s circumstances with insurers across the whole market. We’re able to demonstrate that our clients have been able to obtain the cover they need – and at a competitive price.

We believe this is the level of dedication required under the FCA’s forthcoming Consumer Duty regulations.

The following case is just one example of a client coming to us after being signposted by an insurer who was unable to provide the valuable life cover the client needed.

Having suffered a heart attack six years previously, this male client was able to provide Moneysworth with medical letters from his hospital specialist. This was very useful for us when undertaking our initial research with insurance companies.

To ensure the client was offered the best possible terms and price, we approached every life cover provider in the market.

A number of the insurers were willing to consider an application. The most expensive estimate of premium was £154pm with the three most favourable estimates ranging from £45pm to £67pm. Applications were made to these three companies and, after looking at the medical evidence and applications, all three companies made a formal offer of terms.

Two offers were similar at around £66pm. The best offer was £43.62pm which, over the full term of the policy, would save the client £2,643 compared to the second best offer. With this policy, the premiums and the life cover are guaranteed to remain the same throughout the policy term. Even if the client was diagnosed with a new health condition in the future, it would not affect his cover or the premium.

Naturally, the client was pleased to accept the lowest premium offered and now has peace of mind knowing that, if the worst were to happen, his wife would remain secure in their home and not have a mortgage to worry about.

There’s no better advert than a recommendation from a satisfied client

After the policy started, we received the following review (via Feefo) of the service provided by Moneysworth:

five stars
Absolutely brilliant service from start to finish would highly recommend Moneysworth. The staff are very reliable and so good at what they do. Thank you!

This February is National Heart Month, a time for each of us to reflect on how we can improve the health of our heart. Living with a heart condition can affect not only the individual but their loved ones too.

Having a heart condition has become one of the most common medical problems among clients who ask us to help them find Life Cover.

  • Heart and circulatory diseases cause more than a quarter (26 per cent) of all deaths in the UK; that’s nearly 160,000 deaths each year – an average of 435 people each day or one death every three minutes.
  • There are around 7 million people living with heart and circulatory disease in the UK: 3.5 million men and 3.5 million women.
  • An estimated 915,000 people alive in the UK today (640,000 men and 275,000 women) have survived a heart attack.

Source: British Heart Foundation statistics

Is it possible to get Life Insurance if you have a heart condition?

Finding Life Insurance that suits your needs can be much harder if you’ve had a heart attack, a cardiac arrest or are living with a heart condition. Moneysworth specialise in helping people find Life Cover even if they have a health condition or have been refused life cover elsewhere.  

The most common heart condition we see in our work is a previous heart attack (also known as myocardial infarction). However, over the last seven months, we’ve helped over ninety people with a wide variety of other heart conditions to find life cover. Many of these clients have now successfully started their policy or are currently in the process of applying for cover.

Moneysworth are experts in helping people with heart conditions to find Life Insurance

Over the next few weeks, we’re going to post a series of articles about the circumstances behind some of our clients’ search for life cover: why they needed life insurance, the problems they’d previously encountered when trying to apply for cover elsewhere, and the policy options and prices we were able to obtain for them.

It may surprise you to see how people who are living with a serious heart condition – or even multiple conditions – are still able to find cover, thanks to our team’s expert guidance and assistance.

From 1st July 2018 through to 31st January 2019, Moneysworth helped clients with the following heart conditions to apply for Life Cover :

  1. Angina
  2. Aortic Regurgitation
  3. Aortic Stenosis & Mitral Valve Repair
  4. ARVC (Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Cardiomyopathy)
  5. Atrial Fibrillation
  6. Bicuspid Aortic Vale
  7. Bicuspid Aortic Valve & Heart Beat Irregularity
  8. Bicuspid Aortic Valve & Coarctation Of The Aorta
  9. Blocked Artery / Stenosis
  10. Brugada Syndrome
  11. Cardiac Arrest
  12. Cardiac Arrest & Arrhythmia
  13. Coarctation Of The Aorta
  14. Coarctation Of The Aorta & Chronic Heart Disease
  15. Congenital Aortic Stenosis, Bicuspid Aortic Valve & Atrial Fibrillation
  16. Congenital Bicuspid Aortic Valve & Mitral Valve Prolapse
  17. Congenital Heart Defect
  18. Congenital Subaortic Stenosis
  19. Coronary Artery Angina & Angioplasty
  20. Bicuspid Aeortic Valve
  21. Dilated Cardiomyopathy
  22. Endocarditis
  23. Heart Arrythmia
  24. Heart Attack
  25. Heart Attack & PFO Hole Closure Surgery
  26. Heart Attack & Triple Bypass
  27. Heart Attack & Quadruple Coronary Artery Bypass
  28. Heart Murmur
  29. Heart Murmur & Prolapsed Mitrial Valve
  30. Heart Weakness
  31. Hole In Heart & Missing Valve
  32. Hole In The Heart From Birth & Aortic Valve Replacement
  33. Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy
  34. IHD & Atrial Flutter
  35. LQTS & Tachycardia
  36. Mild Cardiomyopathy & Left Brundle Branch Block
  37. Narrowing Of The Arteries
  38. Paroxsymal Atrial Fibrillation
  39. Paroxysmal AF
  40. Quadruple Bypass
  41. Severe Aortic Regurgitation
  42. Slight Heart Murmur, Enlarged Heart & Atrial Fibrillation
  43. Slight Hole In The Heart
  44. Slightly Enlarged Heart
  45. Suspected Angina, High Blood Pressure & High Cholesterol
  46. Takayasu Arteritis
  47. Transposition Of Great Vessels & Palpitations
  48. Transposition Of The Great Arteries, Pulmonary Stenosis & Coarctation Of Aorta
  49. Triple Bypass & Coronary Artery Disease
  50. Type 1 Brugada & ICD

Yesterday the Advertising Standards Authority listed the 10 most complained about adverts for 2015. Several of the ads related to health issues, including two smoking related advertisements, but the one that really caught my eye was the British Heart Foundation advertisement.

In the advertisement Ben is seated in his classroom at his desk. The classroom is full but his father crouches down in front facing him and Ben asks him why he is there. His father tries to tell him in a quiet voice that he won’t be there anymore and that he is sorry. As both Ben and the viewer try to take in what is being said, the headmaster appears at the door and asks Ben to come outside, by which time you realise that Ben is about to be given the life changing news that his father has died of a heart attack.

Like many when I first saw this advert I found it very moving. The advertisement succeeded in conveying the immediacy of the shock of receiving such terrible news, completely out of the blue. Indeed such is the sudden impact of the shock that Ben simply seems to be trying to process the information he has just been given, as though he has not had time yet to emotionally react or think about what it means. By the time the headmaster opens the door, you feel that you know what is coming next. You are left wondering at how Ben’s life has changed forever in an instant by an outside event over which he had no control. You feel sorry for Ben, desperately sorry.

One reason why this advertisement chimed with me is that I lost my own father prematurely to a heart attack. I was present when the heart attack occurred and I remember sitting with my arm around my mother in the ambulance speeding towards the hospital wondering what the outcome would be. I remember waiting at the hospital as other family members arrived and then after sometime being given the final news. Little did I know then that a number of years later I would experience a similarly shocking event, a phone call in which I would be given the devastating news that another member of my immediate family had died suddenly, leaving a young child.

However the other reason why I think this advertisement is so strong and believable is because it leaves the viewer wondering what the future holds for Ben now that his father has died. My own experience has taught me that the consequences of someone passing on can be profound and long lasting for other family members in all sorts of ways. A sudden death in the family is a game changer for everyone.

I have to confess that when I first saw the advertisement, before I knew the identity of the advertiser, I thought it was advert for life insurance. It is not clear whether or not Ben’s father had life insurance and of course for Ben and his family the first things on their minds would be the funeral arrangements, their grief and their other emotions. However sooner or later practical questions would need answering. How much capital and income will Ben’s mother have? If they have a mortgage is there enough to pay it all off? If not will Ben’s mother have sufficient income to pay the mortgage and keep the family going, or will the family need to move and will Ben have to change schools? What about further down the line as Ben grows older? How will the choices and options available to him match up with what his father would have wished for him? To what extent might those options be limited by a lack of available funds?

In my own case, my father was turned down for life insurance and he was therefore unable to leave any significant financial resource for our family. Thankfully there have been significant developments since then both in terms of the availability of life insurance for people with health conditions and in the medical treatment of heart conditions.

But getting back to the advertisement who were the complainers, why were they complaining and were they right to complain? The advertising standards authority said there were 219 complainers who considered the advertisement to be “distressing for adults and children” (although it seems that steps were taken to avoid showing the advert during children’s programming).

It would not be surprising if the advertisement evoked distress in the minds of some who had lost a close family member or friend and inevitably some people might be upset by what they saw. However just because it might have made for difficult or uncomfortable viewing, does that mean the advert should have been banned? The positive purpose of the advert was to draw public attention to the valuable work of the British Heart Foundation and to show us that heart disease can be fatal with profound life changing consequences. Hopefully the advertisement might have inspired many to consider what now lay ahead for Ben and others like him similarly affected. Viewers might also have been moved to consider what action they might take to reduce their own coronary risks (lose weight, more exercise, stop smoking, etc.) and perhaps to review whether they have sufficient family life insurance protection. Viewers might also consider getting involved in supporting the work of the BHF. For example the Nation Of Lifesavers project aims to make significant improvements in the way the nation deals with cardiac arrests, so as to make a much needed step change in the number of survivors of cardiac arrest outside of hospitals.

Finally, it’s worth mentioning that there is clear evidence in the UK that many families do not carry sufficient life insurance to protect and support the needs of the family should the worst happen. It is frankly astonishing to read various researched reports consistently suggesting that at least 50 % of mortgage holders do not have life insurance to cover their mortgage. One of the reasons sometimes given by those who perhaps should have life insurance but who don’t, is that they don’t like talking about death. But sticking your head in the sand because you feel uncomfortable thinking about death is no excuse for leaving your family and children exposed to the financial consequences of your premature death.

So hats off to the British Heart Foundation for their thought provoking and powerful advertisement. We applaud you!