The Office of Fair Trading has launched an investigation into car insurance costs, which climbed as much as 40 per cent in 12 months.

The government watchdog has asked insurers to justify the huge increases. In particular, it says it will examine why insurance premiums in Northern Ireland are significantly higher than in the rest of the UK. It is also looking into the role of price-comparison sites.

Its call for evidence yesterday could lead to a full inquiry but insurers were quick to defend the increases. Full Post…

Payment protection insurance – also called loan payment protection – is designed to cover debt repayments in the event that borrowers are made redundant or are unable to work due to illness or accident.

Policies usually pay out after a deferred period of either one month, three months or six months and then pay out for a period, from 12 months to two years, if you are unable to work.

The basics

When taking out a loan or credit card you may be given the option of buying PPI.

PPI has been in the news with consumers reporting several problems with the product. Many of the issues have come about where sellers have included the cost of the PPI in the accompanying credit product.

Full Post…

Nancy Germond hosted this weeks Cavalcade of Risk, and theres plenty of Turkey Talk for everyone be sure to stop by and check it out.  I found Jason Shafrins post about patient satisfaction to be particularly interesting.  Medicare is going to start a financial reward/penalty system for hospitals beginning in 2014.  The hospital value-based purchasing (HVBP) program will pay a bonus to hospitals that provide a high quality of care and financially penalize those with low HVBP scores.  Jason weighs a few different angles of this, and particularly looks at the fact that patient satisfaction will be one of the aspects of HVBP.

Prior to working in the health insurance industry, Jay and I both worked at a company where customer satisfaction was a huge part of the business.  Th Full Post…

Term life insurance, while a great choice for many, doesnt fit the needs of every situation.  While I do believe that term life insurance is a great choice for many people, there are situations that require a more permanent option.  As there are many, I will divide them up between several posts.  Here are some reasons to consider permanent insurance:

1. To Pay for Final Expenses This one is a no-brainer.  If you are 55 years old, have a 20 year term policy and live to 90 years old, funds for final expenses will not be coming from a life insurance policy.
2. To Support Children with Special Needs If they outlive you and theres no life insurance in place to help support them, where will the funds come from.  Married couples often purchase Survivorship Life Insurance for this purpose.
3. To Equalize an Estate If you have several children and you leave your business to the one that works in the business, you might want to equalize the amount each child receives.  Permanent life insurance can be the simplest way to do this
4. To pay off a mortgage Most people purchase term life insurance or mortgage insurance so their heirs can pay off the mortgage in the event of the breadwinners death.  However, what if you purchased the house at a later age, or you remortgaged the home to pay for college tuition for your children.  Term life insurance might not last long enough.
5. To replace an estate Some people choose to spend down their assets during their lifetime and use life insurance proceeds to leave a substantial inheritance to their heirs.  Permanent insurance usually makes more sense in these types of situations.

As my list of reasons extends to about 30, I will post 5 at a time.  Visit next week to see the next 5.  In the meantime, if you would like to look at some permanent life insurance quotes, whether its whole life or universal life insurance quotes, visit LifeInsure.com to learn about and get quotes for these product.  If you want term life insurance quotes, you can get them as well.

Aon Risk Solutions has released its Airline Insurance Market Indicators report for 2011/12, as the sector enters its renewal season.

The broker notes that premium volumes are so far holding steady despite significant increases in forecast risk exposures, but with the underlying cost of insurance continuing to slide.

Airline forecasts suggest that fleet values will increase by around 10% during the course of the industrys 2011/12 insurance programmes, with passenger numbers due to rise by 14% during the same period.

Full Post…

Soldiers suffering the invisible wounds of war have a new weapon against post-traumatic stress disorder: smartphone applications.

The Pentagon and Veterans Affairs Department have developed applications with names such as “Breathe2Relax,” “MoodTracker” and others to help soldiers manage their symptoms.

Full Post…