People buy critical illness insurance to protect themselves against certain serious illnesses, diseases, and medical conditions, either for life or for a certain amount of time. It's different from life insurance, which gives you money if you die. Critical illness insurance pays out if an illness or disease makes you sick or hurts your mind.
A critical illness policy will pay you a lump sum that is not subject to taxes if you get one of the illnesses listed in the policy. To make a claim, all you need is for your doctor to say that you have one of the illnesses or conditions listed in the policy. You usually don't have to show that you lost money or need special medical care.
If you're thinking about getting this kind of insurance, you should know that the amount and terms are set when you start your policy.
For the policy to pay out, you must have lived at least 28 days after the illness or condition was found.
Once the set time of the policy has passed and you haven't been diagnosed as having a serious illness or condition then there is no payout and the policy simply ceases.
Before you decide whether or not to get critical illness insurance, you should think about a number of things. The most important thing to decide is how much money you would need if you got seriously sick, and then how long you would need coverage for.
You will also have to think about the different illnesses that are covered, as these can be different from one company to the next. Another thing to think about is that different companies' policies have different exclusions, so make sure you read the fine print.
