Sunday 16 February 2020

Medical Insurance : Everything you need to know!

Medical expenses these days are soaring high, hence medical insurance is a must. We all are well aware of this fact but there are some facts that sometimes go missed, let’s talk about them today.

Most of us have a medical insurance from our employer and hence do not buy a personal medical insurance, let’s take this up first...
Think of a scenario where you are switching from one employer to another and during that gap period you or your family underwent hospitalisation, how will this situation be handled without personal insurance?
Take another important scenario, medical assistance is required most during old age (post retirement), at that time you don’t have an employer to cover and none of the medical insurance companies will give offer you a new policy cover since it becomes high risk case due to the age factor. Now what will you do? Put all your savings into medical expenses?? Not a good idea!
Hence it is a must for each one of us to have a personal insurance. You should always choose to first use employer medical insurance and on exhausting the same, use your personal policy in case required.

Have you heard of Super-TopUp medical insurance? New word... so let’s take this up next!
What will happen in case the hospitalisation bill is more than your insurance amount?
What should be the policy sum insured one should buy? A policy for an individual with sum insured of 3L costs around 3-4k per annum, of 5L costs around 6-8k p.a. and rises accordingly...
In case you buy insurance amount of very high sum insured to cover self/family in most cases, you need to shell out a huge sum of money, so what is the solution to this problem?

The solution is Super Top Up Medical Insurance policy.

Let’s understand this:
Super TopUp policy has a threshold amount and a cover amount. The policy gets triggered only when the bill amount is more than the threshold amount and it covers you for the set cover amount. The good part of this policy comes now- the premium of such a policy is almost negligible compared to the basic medical insurance policy.
Let’s understand with an example: Super TopUp policy of threshold of 5L and cover of 15L would mean that it will cover any medical expenses above 5L for next 15L (from 5L to 20L) and this policy for a couple of age range 30-35 will cost less than 2k p.a.
Hence, one should buy a medical insurance for the basic cover and a super top up policy to cover any higher expenses. All major medical insurance companies offer this product.

Few pointers to keep in mind before deciding on the sum insured of these two policies:
1) All medical bills are according to the room one chooses, the same doctor fee in private ward will be more than semi-private ward and further more than general ward and hence the total bill.
2) In most cases room rent allowed in medical insurance policy is 1% of sum insured, so choose your sum insured keeping this in mind.
Note: This 1% of sum insured refers to basic insurance policy, Super TopUp policy has nothing to do with this. Nowadays there are options available that gives you single most economical room as part of medical insurance cover, so that 1% doesn’t come into picture, still do keep a vigilant eye on this while deciding.
3) Medical expenses vary from place to place, example, room rent in Mumbai is very high compared to Dehi NCR, so your primary location too is an important factor.

Hope you now have the requisite knowledge around the medical insurance.
All the very best and make an informed decision!!
Post in your comments for any specific query and I shall be happy to answer.

Tuesday 11 February 2020

Insurance vs Investment

Do I need Insurance or Investments?
Is Insurance same as Investment?
I'm buying a money guarantee plan or a policy from LIC, will it suffice both my investment and insurance needs?

Confused with many such questions in mind??? Let's begin to find answers!

Always remember: Insurance is a liability while Investment is an asset. You buy Insurance to safeguard yourself from something unknown or unexpected mishap while you Invest with a clear thought or goal in mind, which could be a luxury holiday, marriage, retirement etc.

So, who needs insurance? Anybody who is earning and has someone partially or fully financially dependent on him/her needs an insurance.
And, who needs investment? Actually all of us! Yes, all of us must invest a part of our monthly income, if not for a specific goal, then for our future needs.

LIC gives me both insurance and satisfies investment needs, isn't it the best option to go? - A BIG NO!
Here we are trying to mix a liability and an asset. Let's understand this with an example:
LIC of sum insured of 10 lakhs for 20 years will have a premium of approx 50,000 rupees per year. It promises to give you 10L in case of death (so, covers insurance) and waive off any further premium,  and in case of maturity (i.e. on successful completion of 20 yrs), it promises to pay you a little lesser than double of sum insured, so approx 18-19L. On calculation the return on investment (also called, ROI) comes out to be mere 5-6% (you can try this using any SIP calculator app on your mobile).

So, what should I do? Where to invest? What to buy for insurance ?
First for insurance, one should buy a term insurance plan, which has a simple philosophy, you die, they pay the insurance amount; you don't die, they get to keep the premium you paid. This is exactly similar to our car insurance.
But don't worry, the premium you pay here is mere peanuts.
For instance, buying a policy with sum insured of 50 lakhs running up till 65 yrs of age, a non-smoker 23 year old male needs to pay approx INR 3500 + 18% GST annually, amounting to only 4,130/- rupees per annum.
So even if there is no unfortunate event of death, one ends up paying less than 1.75 lakhs in 42 years, but in case of death, you leave your family a sum of 50 lakhs and further premium are not required to be paid as the policy just ends there.
So compare, LIC paying 10L (with you paying premium of 50k/year) and term insurance paying 50L (with you paying premium of 4130/year).
Hence, my advise: set aside this small amount for term insurance, and save the rest for some better investment options that would give you much higher returns than 5-6% seen in above LIC example.

Next, comes Investment, for this, there are multiple options, varying from Mutual Funds, PPF, FDs, RDs, Stocks etc. I will write a separate post for all such options with their respective pros and cons and approximate ROIs.

Please comment and let me know if this article helped you and if there are any specific questions that I can help you with.

Also, coming soon: Why do I need a separate health insurance policy when my employer already covers me and my family for a handsome amount?

By, Ravi Malik