Family protection is insurance built around a specific question: what happens to the people who depend on you if you die, or become too ill to work. Most families have some cover and have never checked whether it's the right kind, or enough.
We look at what your family would need to cope, a mortgage, lost income, care costs, and match cover to that, rather than selling you a policy first and working backwards.
Book a free consultation →A protection review fits naturally alongside a will or inheritance tax plan, especially where a policy needs to be written in trust rather than left to fall into the estate. We arrange that detail directly with you.
Discuss a referral →Life insurance pays a lump sum, or an ongoing income, if you die during the policy term. For most families it's the first thing to get right: enough to clear a mortgage and give dependents time to adjust, not just a token amount.
Critical illness cover pays out on diagnosis of a serious condition, while you're still alive to use it. It's separate from life insurance and often overlooked, even though a serious diagnosis is, for most people, more likely to happen than an early death.
Income protection replaces a portion of your salary if you can't work due to illness or injury, for as long as you're unable to, not just a fixed payout. Particularly important if you're self-employed, where there's no employer sick pay to fall back on.
Protection insurance is often bought separately from wills and estate planning, but the two are closely connected. A policy written in trust pays out directly to the people you name, avoids inheritance tax, and reaches your family faster than money that has to go through your estate. We arrange protection cover alongside the rest of your plan, so it does what the rest of the plan needs it to do.
"Mr E and his wife had a young family and a mortgage, and had never got round to sorting cover beyond a small policy through his employer. A diagnosis at 41 meant months off work during treatment. Because we'd put critical illness cover in place two years earlier, the payout covered their mortgage and gave them breathing room, without having to sell the house or move the children out of their school."
Life insurance pays out on death. Critical illness cover pays out on diagnosis of a specified serious illness while you're still alive, so the money can go toward treatment, adapting your home, or simply replacing income while you're off work, without you having to wait for anything else.
Often it isn't, and it usually stops the day you leave that job, which tends to be exactly when a family needs it least removed. Worth checking what you have rather than assuming it covers what you think it does.
A life insurance policy written in trust pays out directly to your family rather than through your estate, so it isn't taxed alongside everything else and isn't held up by probate. It can cover exactly the kind of bill, a mortgage, an inheritance tax liability, that would otherwise fall on the people left behind.