Choosing Individual Disability Insurance

We would all like to know exactly what was going to happen to us in the future, good or bad although it is hard planning for the good it is much easier, although less pleasurable to make arrangements for the bad but individual disability insurance can help. With the stress and frustration caused by a temporary or permanent disability, individual disability insurance can help you not only weather the financial difficulties you may encounter during your incapacitation but also to take some of the emotional strain away the financial difficulties it is certain to create. In fact there is a higher probability of a person requiring some form of individual disability insurance before they retire than the likelihood of dying. However more people buy life insurance long before considering the advantages of disability coverage. If you are aged 40 for example, there is a higher chance that you will be disabled, and thus unable to work for a period of 90 days or more, than of you dying before the age of 65.

Owing to the probability of it being used, individual disability insurance is more expensive than life cover and it is important that the most competitive rates are sought. Premiums for individual disability insurance are based on many characteristics like age, occupation, health and the calculations of potential lost income. Many people find that they can reduce their monthly individual disability insurance premiums buy delaying when the first payment would be made to them if they were to make a claim on their individual disability insurance plan. Another option to lower the monthly premiums is put a limit on how long the payments are to be made before they stop although if you your period of incapacitation lasts longer than this, it will mean that you will have to find an alternative source of income.

Insurance company policies will differ but the majority will only pay a percentage of your lost income so it is a good idea to choose the best one for you and in this instance, the cheapest individual disability insurance may not necessarily be the best. Short term individual disability insurance income covers the first few months you are disabled and the benefits of short-term disability income insurance are many. Whereas if someone wants to claim total disability and be completely covered financially, then they will have to prove that they are unable to perform the majority of the tasks that they used to. Irrespective of the type of policy you have, payments for disability are made regularly, every week or month until the end of the incapacitation or the policy, whichever come first.

Other key points to consider when looking into individual disability insurance are if there are restrictions on pre-existing medical conditions, whether your occupation will increase the cost of premiums, how long the payments are made and whether you will have to pay tax on the benefit. Remember that every individual disability insurance policy is different and they will not all provide exactly the same benefits, including how much they will pay as a percentage of your income. To give you an example: some individual disability insurance plans pay out as much as seventy percent of your monthly income in benefit whereas others can pay as low as forty percent so you need to do your research to avoid being paid less than you can afford to survive on. More than any other factor, it is this one that you need to be sure of as once you have taken out the plan and found it necessary to make a claim, it will be too late for you to change it.

To get more info on insurance go to AARP Medical Insurance