Life is good so long as you are able to work and keep receiving your monthly pay check. Once these stop, life becomes a very harsh reality to cope with. There are many reasons one can stop receiving their pay check – most of the time personal reasons or factors beyond their control. Be it automation or a ‘forced’ career break, there are many ways that can deprive us of our monthly cash flow that allows us to ‘survive’. Despite being aware of such unforeseen factors that can be quite devastating to our lifestyle, it is astounding how many people don’t take the necessary step of covering themselves with income protection insurance. While there may be many reasons to not buy a policy, in this post we set the record straight for some of the reasons that are not true, but are still being considered as reasons by some individuals to not protect their income.

Time consuming 

Buying income protection cover is generally perceived to be a time-consuming task, where an individual has to go through rounds of meetings with the insurance agent, provide their medical history and a range of other documents that can often be hard to find the time for. This certainly is a huge turn off, stops us thinking about the future – what happens (and it does happen) if something stops you from working and you didn’t take that half-an-hour to insure yourself? This myth of purchasing income protection as a time consuming, laborious task is certainly just that – a myth. There are many insurance providers, like Aspect Underwriting in Melbourne, who offer online income protection insurance cover within 10 minutes.

While providing all the facilities provided by offline income protection insurers, online income protection cover is a fast-paced service that is built considering the needs of the present generation. Easy and intuitive to use, such online platforms provide users the facility to choose the range of their cover, see their payment and benefit breakdowns and the ability to purchase it straightaway using popular online payment methods.

Inflexible Mental Health Cover 

The case of Julie Gilbert wherein she was denied income protection because she had received counselling for sexual abuse was an eye opener for many individuals and subsequently a reason for not getting an insurance protection quote. The case reflected the inflexibility that some insurance providers might have when covering mental health. While there are many life insurance providers that have such practices, there are some who don’t have such restrictions. In fact some don’t even consider ‘counselling’ as treatment and provide full mental health cover in such cases.

However, it is important for an individual to understand the difference between pre-existing illness and counselling. If you have pre-existing mental illness, then you might not be eligible for a certain period and once that time is over, your insurer will cover you for pre-existing illness, including mental health. If you have had just counselling, then it may not be considered treatment and therefore not restrict you from getting covered for mental health immediately. So, if you have had treatment for mental illness, check with the insurer the period that they don’t cover mental illness for and the period after which they will remove the pre-existing illness exclusion. This should be fairly simple to know from the insurer and should not hold you back from getting your income insured.

Intrusive Access to Medical Records 

Gilbert’s case led her to launch a campaign for changing mental health clauses which allow insurers to have access to customer’s medical history if the customer has declared having mental health treatments in their insurance application. This is something that many legal advocates consider as an unfair breach of consumers’ privacy and many individuals who are conscious of their privacy, have steered clear of getting income protection cover. If you are also concerned of giving an insurer an ‘open-ended’ access to your medical records, then I have good news for you.

Providing the insurer access to all your medical records is no longer required by some insurance agencies. Now you can purchase income protection cover without revealing much of your private details. Some insurers, like Aspect Underwriting, don’t need to know about your previous treatments until you lodge a claim and only then do they investigate if the condition you’re claiming for is a pre-existing illness. This is something you would have been clear on when you purchased your policy and so would not come as a surprise at claim time. This is a most welcome feature for privacy advocates and for customers.

Though income protection has its own shortcomings, nonetheless it is one of the best arrangements you can rely on to continue your lifestyle while navigating your way through challenges of returning to full health. Look out for progressive insurance agencies that provide innovative, flexible, speedy and less-intrusive income protection cover today and prepare yourself for any unforeseen testing times. You’ll thank yourself for going through the process.

== About the Author ===

Mike Wallis, is the founder of Aspect Underwriting, a boutique insurance agency in Melbourne. Having worked in the accident & health insurance sector, both in England and Australia, for over two decades, he shares his insights about the industry on various online platforms and can be reached at [email protected]