There's not much cool factor in life
insurance. Many of the common
perceptions of the industry as staid and
frightenly conservative have some basis
of truth behind them. Finally,
something exciting in the world of
life
insurance. Hybrid term life
insurance. Let's take a look
at one of the many shoots of innovation
now entering the market much to your
benefit.
We
have wondered when the life insurance
industry might follow health insurance
in the transformative change towards
better and more user friendly tools and
processes. Hybrid life insurance
is an indication that it's finally
started. Just to give you some
background, I have a great deal of
experience in the health insurance and
life insurance market. It was
always frustrating to watch the sluggish
movement that life insurance made in
light of health insurance adoption of
online applications, instant
underwriting in some cases, and a rich
plethora of plan options. Let's
face it...life insurance is a
conservative industry for a reason...it
needs to be in some respects but that
shouldn't stifle innovation. This
brings us to hybrid life insurance.
We
are quietly excited about this new
product. First a quick lay of the
term life insurance landscape. In
a simplified view, we have underwritten
term life plans which is majority of the
market and probably what you're thinking
of when
shopping for life insurance.
A new addition to this traditional life
option is no medical life insurance.
This address the need for people who may
be unable to qualify for standard
underwritten life policies. Hybrid
is somewhere in the middle. We
expect a big push in this direction and
in general, we think it's a great
benefit for life insurance shoppers.
Hybrid life insurance combines an almost
instant and simplified approval for life
insurance associated with accidental
death. This is based on a few
health questions and no paramedical
exam. You then have a period of
time in which to get a paramedical
exam...say six month to extend this
dollar amount to all standard causes of
death. The benefit is that the
pricing is closer to the traditionally
underwritten life insurance plans while
the underwriting process is closer to
the
no medical life insurance plans.
Traditional life underwriting is usually
cheaper (depending on health) but takes
a while to process. No medical is
usually more expensive (per dollar of
coverage) but process very fast (if not
instantly). Hybrid life insurance,
as it's name denotes, is a nice middle
ground. Fast underwriting for
accidental death with the option to more
fully underwrite (via the paramedical
exam) in order to get the better rates
of a traditional plan.
This is all relatively new so information is coming out all the time.
We would be happy to run a hybrid life
insurance quote in addition to the other
plans on the market through our
term
life quote request form. It's hard
to get excited about life insurance but
for now, this is as close as we come.
Let's hope it's the beginning of a sea
change in life insurance market
innovation. As always, we are
constantly scouring the market for new
and affordable life insurance options
for our clients. As your licensed
independent broker, that's our job. |