What is income protection insurance?
Question asked by Joan Whitfield
I am thinking about taking out Income Insurance but want to make sure that the insurer won’t just increase the premiums if I need to make a claim on the policy. What is the effect on my premiums should I make a claim?
Although with some types of insurance the premiums charged do increase if you make claims, with Income Protection this is not usually the case.
Some insurance products (such as Private Health Insurance and car insurance) tend to come with a no claims discount. With these plans you lose your no claims discount (or a proportion of it) if you make claims, which increases your premiums.
However, Income Protection plans do not usually come with a no claims discount and therefore claims will not impact on the premiums you pay. In other words, you can make as many claims as you need to and this will not increase your monthly premium.
It is important to note, however, that if you take out a plan with ‘reviewable premiums’ the insurer can increase premiums based on their overall level of claims across all customers. If you select the option of ‘guaranteed premiums’ then the insurer cannot increase your premiums at all.