Importance of Insurance - Part 4

Be safe or You'll be sorry! Part 4

Choosing the right Life Insurance Company

Here's the next part of my continuing coverage on Insurance. You would have read my earlier post on the quantum for which an individual should obtain a life cover:

• Be safe, or you'll be sorry - Part 3

In this post, I propose to talk about how to identify a suitable life insurance company.

How do you choose a life insurance company from which you can buy a life insurance policy? Some points to note:

• The industry has evolved over the years. Despite MoneyLife (magazine, website) and others who claim that our regulators are toothless tigers, IRDA has evolved into a regulator on which I'll personally have quite a lot of confidence and trust.
• Based on the IRDA norms, virtually every single player in the insurance industry has to take care of issues like capital adequacy, sustainability of the policy, basic levels of customer satisfaction, etc. There's always scope for improvement, but then, things are broadly "so okay" now that you can go ahead and rely on any life insurance company - All of them are "reasonably" reliable and trustworthy.
• Having mentioned the above, it is possible that you might be personally uncomfortable with Company X or Management Y - with or without any reason whatsoever. By all means, drop those companies from your list of "suitable life insurance companies" - After all, unlike a few years ago, today you have the luxury of CHOICE - There are quite a few active life insurance companies even if you decide that you don't wish to buy a policy from half a dozen companies.
• Next, look at GEOGRAPHY. It is possible that a couple of specific life insurance companies may be relatively inactive or perhaps even be absent in your city / town / village. While it may still be OK to take a policy from such a life insurance company, it is likely to be that much more difficult to handle issues related to claims processing - Certainly in comparison with another life insurance company which has an active presence in your place of residence.
• Now, you have a bunch of companies which continue to survive in your shortlist of life insurance companies from which you can consider buying a life insurance policy.
• Thanks to the first point above, you can virtually choose ANY of the above life insurance companies that continue to be part of your shortlist.

In my next post, I propose to write about the actual process that you need to follow to try and identify that particular policy that will be suitable for your specific needs.

Watch this space!

Regards,

N