Income Protection Insurance

If you took out income protection insurance before the COVID-19 pandemic began, you should still be covered if you’re made unemployed or are seriously ill from coronavirus. However, you should check your policy wording, in case there are any listed exclusions. In most cases of COVID-19 though, illness is mild and you probably won’t need to rely on income protection insurance. You should be fine to take standard sick leave.

In terms of getting a new income protection insurance policy, we’re currently unable to offer comparison for unemployment cover, as some insurance providers aren’t offering policies. If you’re looking for accident and sickness cover, you should be able to find cover.

Yes you can. Because the policies are designed to help over different time periods and in different situations, having a combination of policies will offer the greatest protection – but you will be paying multiple premiums. For example, you may want an ASU to protect you for redundancy and a PHI policy to cover you if illness or accident stops you working.

Remember too, every policy has a minimum claim period of 30 days. This means that if you’re not off work for a full 30 days, you can’t make a claim. Policies may also have an excess period. This is the time after you’ve been signed off work or become redundant that you won’t be covered for.

In some cases, the excess period will be nil, meaning you can claim back to day 1 providing you’ve been off for the minimum claim period. But the whole of the minimum claim period has to elapse before you can be paid out. This is the same for accident and sickness only, unemployment only and ASU policies.

If you’re employed, you want to take into account any benefits offered by your employer, such as sickness benefits, when deciding on how much cover you need and what the excess should be.

If you’re self-employed, you’ll need to consider how long you can afford to wait before your policy kicks in when selecting your policy and excess period.

You might also consider combining a sickness policy with a short excess period, and a PHI policy with a much longer excess, to maximise the period that you could potentially receive a payout for.

It’s also important to remember the maximum limits, which may be 50%-70% of your monthly salary, no matter how many policies you have.

Not at all. The idea is that the insurance takes over when your sick pay ends. If you fall ill, some employers will still pay your salary for a set period – sometimes for up to 12 months. Check how much your employer will give you and for how long.

The longer you receive a salary, the longer you can make your deferment period. Many policies won’t pay out if you’re still receiving a salary.

If you’re self-employed, you won’t have traditional employee benefits, so income protection is something you should consider.

Unlike an employee, if you’re a sole trader you won’t be entitled to sick pay or redundancy pay. Income protection can give you the peace of mind that you’re financially protected if you’re unable to work.

Find out more about self-employed income protection.

Income protection usually only covers part of what you earned before you were unable to work; typically, around 50 to 60% of your gross monthly income.

If you have short-term income protection, unemployment insurance or a bundled ASU policy, you should receive a pay-out if you lose your job.

However, you won’t be able to claim if you buy a policy after your redundancy has already been announced. It’s also very unlikely you’ll receive a pay out if you take out voluntary redundancy.

Check the terms and conditions before you buy to make sure you’d qualify for unemployment protection.

All unemployment policies have an unemployment initial exclusion period. This is a 90 to 120 day period, depending on the insurance provider, in which the customer is unable to make a claim. This is to safeguard the provider against people taking out a policy when they’re already aware they’ll be made redundant in the near future.

No. If you die, your income protection insurance will no longer be valid. If you have dependents who rely on your income, you may also want to consider taking out life insurance. This will give your family financial protection in the event of your death.

It’s easy to compare prices and the different levels of cover with Compare the Market. Just use our income protection comparison service and fill in your details and what cover you’re interested in. It only takes a few minutes to see what quotes are available to you. The insurance market is very competitive, so it’s a good idea to compare policies and prices to get the right cover at the right price.

Make sure you check the details of the policy, not just the price, as they will all offer slightly different cover.