Accidents of any kind whether at road, at workplace or at your home can be painful and may have a devastating effect on personal finances or income security. We often hear of people dying in an accident at a young age leaving his family behind with lesser income security and loads of future responsibilities.
Although a term life policy will make a lump sum payment to the family of the deceased in accidental death cases, disability and resulting loss of income stands uncovered. With ever increasing number of road accidents and resulting deaths or disabilities it is always advisable to have a personal accident policy in place for unexpected distress times.
A personal accidental policy acts as a financial shield for an individual if he dies or loses his income after a serious accident. In this article we will give you some good reasons to get covered yourself with a personal accident cover.
- Coverage: It covers you 24 x 7 worldwide cover for accidental death and disability. Thus wherever you are and at whatever time your policy depending on its terms and conditions acts as a shield to protect you and your loved ones financially from any possible accident.
- Additional financial protection: Human life is precious. For a personal accident policy sum insured can go up to multiple times of your current annual income. You can opt for a personal accident policy in addition to a term life insurance and both the policy will pay out as a lump sum in case of an accidental death. As it generally provides a lifetime renewal benefit compared to term life insurance it may provide a huge financial relief in case of such an unexpected loss in an accident.
- It’s Cheap: Personal accident policies come at quite a low cost. There are some policies available in the market which provides cover of INR 10 lakh at premium of as low as a few hundred bucks. Other policies may cost a bit more depending on the type of coverage incorporated therein. But in any case it comes at a very pocket friendly price which an individual can easily purchase to cover him and protect his family from financial implications of an accident.
- Easily available: It is easily available online at the ease of a few clicks without asking for any medical reports or complicated documentation. Many banks also provide such policies to their account holders at cheap premium. There are many other options e.g. from agents to purchase this product which is easy, free from complicated process and hassles.
- Covers temporary loss of income: In addition to coverage of death and permanent disability in which a lump sum payment is made out most personal accident policies cover temporary total disablement. This is useful if you cannot attend office or business due to a temporary disablement resulting from an accident and hence suffer a loss of income. Coverage may extend to as long as 100 weeks and in general cases the insurer will pay a weekly benefit expressed as a percentage of your monthly income.
- Wide range of cover: Nowadays as insurers are brainstorming to supply next generation products to the population, some personal accident policies have started covering adventure sports in a non-professional capacity as well which is generally excluded in a vanilla accidental policy. Although these sports are a choice of many young and middle aged people today, a serious accident while engaging in adventure sports can have severe financial impact. Some named adventure sports like Sky sports, mountain sports, water sports and racing sports are covered under this rider.
Depending upon the policy chosen and payment of some extra premium, there are some other important additional covers available with the personal accident policy:
- Children education benefit is provided as a one-time lump sum payment in case of an accidental death or permanent disability of an individual. This largely helps in funding the education of one or two children as per policy terms in case of an accident of the parent.
- Hospitalization expenses are paid by the insurer for inpatient and day care treatment including pre hospitalization and post hospitalization expenses in case of an admission following an accidental injury. You have the freedom to use this add on keeping your health insurance sum insured intact.
- Ambulance cover may include air as well as road ambulance.
- Hospital cash benefit for per day hospital stay. This reduces the extra financial burden at times where income is also lost and the family is facing turbulent times.
- Payment of lump sum benefit for being in a hospital in a comatose state following an accident.
- Lump sum payment for fracture of bones due to an accident as per the benefit chart in the policy is payable.
- EMI Protector is also available to mitigate the burden of paying monthly installments in case of a permanent partial disability.
- Loan protector pays your outstanding loan balance in case of accidental death and permanent total disablement.
Policyholders are free to choose any add on covers as per their requirements and budget. It is advised to policyholders to go through the benefit charts and other terms of the policy document to have a clear understanding of what is payable and what is not. Considering the low price and high necessity this product is highly recommended for everyone, irrespective of gender, age and social status.
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