Your Life Insurance Covers Covid-19. If You Need Coverage, Move Quickly.
What I am finding is my clients are realizing that they or family members (kids, nieces, nephews…) are underinsured for insurance. With the current situation, we are hearing from the experts that it is going to become more expensive and harder to get coverage….
I would like to extend an offer to you or your family to do a free insurance review which can include life, disability, and long term care insurance. See the latest article below!
Americans who have life insurance will be covered should they die from Covid-19, the disease caused by the new coronavirus, but those who lack coverage or are underinsured should consider moving soon before coverage options dry up.
If the pandemic worsens, industry experts say, life-insurance companies may institute stricter guidelines for underwriting. Insurers might also increase premiums in the future as many are suffering losses on their investments amid the sharp declines in financial markets.
“I have not seen a policy that has a carve-out or an exclusion for a pandemic,” says Erin Ardleigh, founder and president of Dynama Insurance, an independent insurance brokerage firm based in New York City. Still, she says, now is a good time to beef up coverage.
Already, some insurance carriers have begun adding exclusionary riders on new policies to avoid paying out on coronavirus deaths, says Anthony Martin, founder and chief executive of life-insurance company Choice Mutual. “An exclusion rider…could become an industry standard if the morbidity rate causes carriers to experience detrimental financial losses due to an unexpected and unsustainable claims rate,” he says.
Martin also says some carriers may stop issuing new policies if the pandemic worsens, especially for seniors with health issues, and they likely wouldn’t resume issuing policies until a vaccine is available.
Many insurance companies are asking applicants if they’ve been tested or treated for the virus, and then once the policy is approved, they are asking applicants to sign a statement noting that nothing about their health status has changed during the application process.
If a person buys a policy today and dies next month from coronavirus, his family will get the insurance money, so long as the applicant didn’t misrepresent his health status at the time of application, Ardleigh says. Yet if the patient dies within two years of obtaining a policy and the insurance company can prove that he misrepresented his health status, the company won’t have to pay up.
People who have been hospitalized due to the coronavirus and have made a full recovery still may have difficulty obtaining coverage because the typical application asks whether the person had been hospitalized in the past year. But patients who weren’t hospitalized and have recovered typically will have no issue getting coverage, Martin said.
If any of this sounds daunting, just know that it does’t have to be. You can start by doing a quick calculation on your own to see if you need life insurance with this Life Insurance Needs Calculator (or just click on “What’s Next” below). And just know that you can also talk things through with an insurance agent—at no cost. They will help you figure out how much you may need, and also find a policy that fits into your budget. If you don’t have an agent, you can use this Agent Locator to find one in your area.