How To Choose A Life Insurance Plan In Nigeria

Life Insurance is all about protecting your future and that of your family/dependants. Life Insurance nowadays is more fashionable because there are many products that involve benefits being payable even before death. There are products for family, kid�s education, capital accumulation, thrift savings plan and so on.
No matter the type of cover you choose, factors ranging from your needs to your age and much more will determine your premium. This post is coming with a purpose of enlightening you on how to purchase a cover that will be of benefit to you.

How To Choose A Life Insurance Plan

1. DETERMINE YOUR NEED

Before you fill the proposal form or issue your cheque, the first thing to do it to determine exactly what your need is. How to do this is to look within. Answer basic questions like:
Are you single or married?
Do you have kids and how many?
What are your running expenses?
Can you afford to keep paying the premium?
It is essential to answer these questions because life insurance involves premium payment which is periodical. You are to estimate your living expenses and add the insurance premium and see how it goes. It is important because once you start should be able to sustain your payment without which you will not be able to reap your full benefit. Also answering these questions will go a long way to help in this next step below.

2. MAKE YOUR CHOICE

There are different life insurance covers available you can choose from. Here are the basic plans: Term assurance, whole life assurance and endowment plan.

• Term Assurance: provides cover for a specific period and will only pay out if the life assured dies during the period. It is the most basic of all life assurance policies. However, if the assured survives, no payment is made and the policy expires. There are different types of term assurance:

1. Level Term Assurance
2. Renewable Term Assurance
3. Convertible Term Assurance
4. Increasing Term Assurance
5. Decreasing Term Assurance
6. Family Income Policy
7. Increasing Family Income Policy
8. Unit-Linked Term Assurance

• Whole Life Assurance: is a very simple policy which pays out whenever the life assured dies. This is different from Term Assurance because it is a permanent policy, hence it does not expire. It is more expensive. Whole life is a substantive policy and can be used as security for loans. There are different types of Whole Life Cover:

1. Non-profit Whole Life Policy
2. With-profit Whole Life Policy
3. Low-Cost Whole Life Policy
4. Single Premium Unit-Linked Whole Life Policy
5. Regular Premium Unit-Linked Whole Life Policy

• Endowment Plan: Allows the sum assured to be payable on a fixed date � the maturity date � or on the life of assured�s earlier death. What this mean is that if the assured did not die, the payout will go to him but if he does, it goes to his beneficiaries. Endowment policies are substantive policies because there will be payout at a point in the future and can be used as a security for loans. The following are the types of endowment policies:

1. Non-profit endowments
2. With-profit endowments
3. Low-cost endowments
4. Low-start endowments
5. Flexidowments
6. Unit-Linked Endowments
7. Pure Endowments
8. Guaranteed Bonds

 
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How To Make A Third Party Car Insurance Claim

 

Do you know that your Third Party Car Insurance Certificate in Nigeria has a N1,000,000 property damage cover on it? Do you also know that the life cover on it is unlimited? If you don�t know, now you know. Your Third Party Car Insurance Certificate is more than �Police-let-me-pass� as it is commonly called in Nigeria, it is a valid piece of paper!
The issue of whether Insurance Companies pay claim is no more an issue presently because the Insurance Industry has been revamped. Please feel free to read Why Insurance Companies Don�t Pay Claims. Now how do you make a Third Party Claim?

How To Make A Third Party Car Insurance Claim

A Third Party Only Car Insurance covers your legal liability (as a holder or insured) to third parties in respect of any damage to their properties (minimum of N1m) and for any injury or death(unlimited) to them from the use your motor vehicle. It also covers your legal fees for defense of a claim in court.
To make a Third Party Claim follow the steps below carefully.

1. NOTIFICATION

Once an accident, loss or damage occurs and it was decided that you are at fault by the officer or people on the spot, contact your insurer immediately. Note that you are not supposed to admit liability on behalf of the insurer; it is the duty of the third party to prove liability or be determined in the court. Call your insurer on phone and for documentary purpose write a letter of notification or email to your insurer. The letter should give a very brief description of the incident stating the date and time of the loss. Since this is a third party claim thus any impending prosecution, inquest or fatal inquiry in respect of the occurrence should be communicated to the insurer with your letter or in subsequent letters. Also, any claim letter from the third party, writ summons and process should be forwarded to the insurer immediately.

2. ACKNOWLEDGMENT 

After your notification has been received, the insurer writes to sympathize with and assures you of handling the claim or to reject the claim if you are not covered. If the claim is not repudiated, the insurer�s letter will be accompanied with a claim form for you to fill. The claim form asks detailed questions relating to the claim. The form helps to get a clear description of the claim. Ensure you complete it accurately without misrepresenting anything. The information you put down in the claim form should be the same as those in the Police Report. The insurer will request for some claim substantiating documents which include:
For Property Damage Claim

• Estimate of repairs
• Photographs of the accidental vehicles
• Third Party claim letter
• Driver�s statement of loss
• Police report
• Driver�s license of the driver in charge of the vehicle prior to the accident

For Death or injury claim

• Writ summons or court order
• Police Report
• Third Party claim letter
• Photographs of the accident
• Hospital bill
• Death certificate
• Corona�s report
• Driver�s statement of loss
• Driver�s license of the driver in charge of the vehicle prior to the accident

After you have gotten the documents, attach them to the Completed Claim Form and forward to the insurer (originals should be forwarded to avoid unnecessary delay).

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How To Protect Your Assets With Insurance

Assets are your possessions that make life easy for you; they are parts of your life. Assets can range from material to non-material. I want to adopt another view as to what constitute an asset.
My view is that assets do not necessarily mean things with financial values alone like cars, houses, business premises, machines etc. I believe what constitute an asset depends on an individual. This means things that assist such a person in earning a living e.g. a footballer�s asset could be his leg while a singer�s greatest asset could be his or her voice. As a bread winner your asset could be your lucrative job, your business, your house, your taxi etc. It will interest you to know that all these assets can and have been insured.
We are going to observe some risks that assets are exposed to and how one can protect his or her assets from them. As an individual or business it is important to protect your asset and that with appropriate insurance policies.
We are going to consider:

• Protecting your Asset as an individual
• Protecting your assets as a business or corporate body

1. FIRE, FLOODING, LANDSLIDE, HURRICANE AND OTHER NATURAL DISASTERS

These risks usually have devastating effects on assets. Fire can cause a lot of damage on buildings, cars and other physical assets so also can the other perils. Every person or business faces all the above listed risks. An insurance policy will not prevent them from occurring but it will be there for you when it does happen so that you will not end up losing everything you own to them. If your house gets burnt without an insurance policy you have lost all!
INSURANCE PROTECTION: These risks can be covered under Fire and Special Perils Insurance Policy. I am going to spare you the technical jargons. This policy covers loss or damage of properties against fire, lightning, explosion of boilers or gas, storm, flood, burst pipes and overflowing of water tanks, impact of vehicles, malicious damage, earthquake damage, aircraft damage, bush fire, tornado and cyclone as well as riot and strike. This insurance coverage is very cheap when you have to consider the premium payable vis-�-vis the value of the property. For example, if your house costs N10m and insuring it, you were charged a rate of 0.225%. This will make the annual premium you are going to pay to be N22,500. With that little amount you are covered under a fire and special perils for a year until renewal.
ALSO READ: How to choose a life insurance plan

2. THEFT, BURGLARY AND HOUSEBREAKING

Every home or business is faced with the challenge of being robbed. Depending on the area of residence houses get burgled and robbed occasionally. Armed robbers, thieves, vandals etc are threats to houses or apartments.
INSURANCE PROTECTION: What you can do to protect your priced assets like your home and properties is Burglary and Housebreaking Insurance. This policy covers your property against loss or damage by theft. It should be noted that the policy covers not only the stolen goods but also the damage inflicted on doors or safe by the burglar in an attempt to gain entrance to the property. It should be noted here that the insurance definition of Theft is different from its legal definition. In Insurance, theft must involve violence and application of force i.e. entry into or exit from a premises by forcible and violent means. This definition excludes stealing by tricks or any means other than the use of some form of force. However, your private residence burglary policy can cover such theft that does not include force (this is called larceny), which is covered at an additional premium. Burglary insurance too is not expensive. For example if all the content in your house or apartment is valued at N5m then depending on the area you reside the insurer might charge you 0.5% rate which makes your premium be N25,000. Kindly note that the rate is applied only to content of the building because it is not possible for a building to be stolen!


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How To Detect A Fake Third Party Motor Insurance Certificate

To drive a car on Nigerian road one of the major requirements is for you to have a minimum of Third Party Motor Insurance Certificate. This is enshrined in the Section 68 of the 2003 Insurance Act which states, �No person shall use or cause or permit any other person to use a motor vehicle on a road unless a liability, which he may thereby incur in respect of damage to the property of third parties is insured with an insurer registered under this Act.�

But besides the legal aspect of it, do you know that there is N1m property damage cover and unlimited life cover to Third Parties on your Insurance Certificate? It is a sad situation in Nigeria that people are ignorantly or willfully (because of cost) purchasing fake certificates. My people, the bible says, perish for lack of knowledge. According to The police 90 per cent of Third Party Motor Insurance Certificates presented to them on demand by motorists at checkpoints are fake!

Ordinarily it is quite difficult to different between an authentic and a fake certificate because of the quality of the finishing of some of the certificates. But in 2012 the industry inaugurated the Nigerian Insurance Industry Database (NIID) with the mission to wipe out fake papers to give room for genuine ones to boom in the nation. This will allow law enforcement agents and vehicle owners to verify the authenticity of motor certificates within a minute! The Police now will be able to detect with a certain electronic device in their possession if your certificate is real or fake. Please do not be caught unawares, read on to find out how to detect the fake one yourself before it is too late.

There are three methods to it.

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