When you first start looking at insurance quotes you might find that some of the different types of cover sound so similar that you aren’t sure which one is best for you. Many people find that this is especially true when they are looking for something to protect them and their family in the event of ill health.
You might start looking for life insurance quotes and come across the option of critical illness cover. So which one of these two is more likely to be suitable for your needs?
Cover for Illness of for Death?
Once we start looking at these two types of insurance we can see that they are actually a lot less similar than you might have first thought. Life insurance pays out a lump sum upon the death of the insured person, while critical illness cover pays out if they are diagnosed with a critical illness or condition and survive. An important point to bear in mind here is that you need to survive a certain number of days after being diagnosed, with the exact period being written into your policy. However, provided that you survive this period after being diagnosed the critical illness policy will pay out regardless of whether or not your health worsens or you make a complete recovery. With both types of policy the cover ends once a claim has been made and paid out on.
What Types of Illness or Condition Are Covered?
Life insurance policies tend to be very simple when it comes to the causes of death which are covered. Generally, any claim will be paid out on provided that death wasn’t caused by any of the specific policy exclusions. These exclusions are usually extremely limited in number and would cover the likes of suicide. Critical illness cover is a little more complicated, at it will pay out once the insured person is diagnosed with one of several types of serious illness or condition. These will be listed on the policy document and you should expect to find things like strokes, cancer and blindness among others. Any other serious illness which is diagnosed but isn’t on the list won’t be covered by a critical illness policy.
What Is Your Situation?
Now that you know the difference between these two different types of policy it really comes down to your own situation and personal preference. Perhaps the easiest way to look at this is to consider which situation causes you most worries; the thought of dying and leaving your family unprotected or the idea of being too ill to work and, again, causing financial problems for your loved ones. Clearly these are two different types of situation which aren’t very pleasant to think about for any of us. However, in order to make the best decision it is something which you need to think about at some point. As with any type of insurance policy, once you make the decision and arrange the cover you can put it to the back of your mind again and go back to enjoying life.
