Climate Changes Causing Disaster, Mass Evacuation and Insurance Claim Backlogs

Year round flooding on a global scale is very much in prospect for the foreseeable future. This statement is borne from the evidence of today.

In addition to flooding, raging bush and scrubland fires caused by natural events are becoming more severe that scientists believe they are due to global temperature increases. World headlines cannot be ignored, neither can the proof that is pitifully visual, because modern communications allow us access to the devastation.

Most people around the world are insured against disaster and have a right to expect that their claim will be handled sympathetically and with reasonable efficiency by their chosen Insurer. So many families have been forced to evacuate their homes and in some cases have to prevail in unsavoury conditions in accommodation provided by emergency services. Most are happy just to be safe but as time draws on the patience and camaraderie wears thin.

The pressure that Insurers are having to put up with is very much of their own making because of their policies in procuring supply chain Contractors. They almost without exception pressurise for lower and lower prices and then demand exceptionally high levels of service. The simple truth is obvious, You cannot get a dollar from a two cent pot. In Cumbria NW England an estimated 270 families have been evacuated into temporary accommodation as a result of flooding. The areas around Sydney Australia and LA in the US have suffered disastrous bush and scrub fires and everyone has seen the devastation caused by water in New Orleans and SE Asia. These disasters were caused by climatic conditions that some have attributed to Global Warming.

It has been calculated that approximately 40,000 families have been displaced and this is only from the newsworthy areas.

So where does the Policy Holder go to ensure that his claim is accepted? Not just accepted but in a reasonable timescale and to a proper standard? How are you to enter the weird and mystical world of Insurance settlements? Well, it all starts with the proper selection of your policy.

There are literally thousands of Insurance Companies that are able to supply you and they will offer you incentives to buy from them. They want you to buy on price. You should not be tempted, look for value for money. Make a list of the key things that are important to you and shop around until you have these issues covered. Be sure, and check your current Insurers out. You may well have been with them for years but they may not have a track record in handling disasters.

You need to be able to control and trust all the supply chain Contractors. These consist of Restoration Companies, Specialist Restorers, Builders, Decorators and Ground Workers. Never forget that you have control of your home even if it is in need of substantial restoration. Your homes threshold is inviolate and should remain under your control. Because of the shear volume of claims nobody has the time to manage affairs as well as you can.

Almost certainly a Loss Adjuster will be instructed to manage your claim on behalf of Insurers. Their charter requires them to stand square between the Insurer and the Policy Holder. Their role is to ensure that the terms of the policy are strictly adhered to by both parties. Wonderful because the reality is a bit grey. Insurers are treating them as part of the supply chain and putting them under pressure to reduce claim costs. This action alone could ruin your claim. You need to know how to handle Loss Adjusters.

Because the worlds climate is changing and causing exceptional conditions from natural disasters we all need to be very focused on what could happen to our community and our way of life. Therefore we have to protect it and the only way to do that is to ensure it. So, What happens next with your situation.

You need the knowledge of how to control affairs of your home and all your contents if you ever have a disaster in your property. There are ten key stages of your claim that you need to understand and control each on of them because there is little question that the unsuspecting and safe amongst us will suffer a disaster at some point. Don't allow others to short change you. Don't allow them to undermine your entitlement under your policy.

The Best Disability Insurance to Protect Your Family

Most people would agree that they work very hard for their money. Even more people would agree that their motivation for working hard is to support and provide the best life style possible for their family. Whether you are a doctor, engineer, nurse, teacher, plumber or a truck driver you should have Disability insurance as a means of protecting the hard work you've put toward providing for yourself, your family and your future.

If you do not already know, Disability insurance is a product used to protect a person's ability to work and earn an income. If you are unable to work due to an illness or injury, Disability insurance will provide you with a monthly benefit to replace a percentage of your normal income. The amount of disability benefit you can obtain is directly impacted by your actual earnings. Most professionals are able to insure up to around 60% of their annual income, however higher earners will be capped at approximately 50-55%.

Disability insurance can be obtained in 3 different ways: through an employer, a professional association or on an individual basis. Individual coverage that is purchased directly from an insurance company through a broker or agent will provide the most comprehensive protection available today. It is more expensive than coverage provided through a group or association, but it will also pay out higher claims and in more claims scenarios than group or association coverage will.

The provisions of an individual Disability insurance policy will be much more favorable than those in a group or association policy. Three of the biggest concerns are: the definition of disability, mental/nervous benefit limitations and benefit offsets.

Individual Disability insurance allows you to maintain an Own-Occupation definition of disability through the entire benefit period of the contract. Group and association coverage however, will often change to an Any-Occupation definition after 2 or 3 years of being on claim. Essentially this means that instead of protecting your specific occupation, you may be required to work elsewhere in a different occupation if you are able.

Depending on the insurance company you work with, an individual Disability insurance policy will allow you to receive benefits for Mental and/or Nervous conditions throughout the entire policy benefit period. Group and association Disability insurance however will commonly limit the available benefit period for Mental and/or Nervous conditions to 2 years. Although this is a condition that most people cannot imagine ever experiencing, it is one of the leading causes of claims. If you can avoid it, you do not want to limit your benefits for Mental/Nervous conditions.

The final concern is that Group and Association Disability insurance benefits will often be off-settable by Social Security benefits. This means that if you were eligible for Social Security Disability benefits, your Group or Association Disability benefit would reduce dollar-for-dollar with any and all benefits you receive from Social Security. Although it is very difficult to qualify for Social Security benefits, if you do qualify, your situation will likely be bad enough that you will not want to deal with a reduction in benefits of any sort. Most individual Disability insurance will not offset benefits with those received from Social Security. Even those policies that do have off-settable benefits will have limits on how much can be offset.

Although the premiums may be higher for individual Disability insurance, in the situation of an actual claim, you will realize that Group and Association coverage ends up costing more, because it does not end up paying as much as individual coverage does. Before making your decision to buy Group or Association coverage, speak with a specialist. Most brokers or agents would be happy to compare the benefits of a Group or Association plan with that of an individual policy. The differences are significant, and you will likely realize that individual Disability insurance is the better option.

Surviving a Home Assessment by the Insurance Company's Occupational Therapist

After a serious car accident in Ontario and many other jurisdictions, you may be entitled to housekeeping and / or attendant care. Often the insurance company will send in their own assessor to determine what is the appropriate amount of your benefit.

In the past few months, we have seen an increased number of insurance company in-home assessments which significantly undervalue the time allotted for our clients' housekeeping and attendant care needs.

When this happens, it often creates financial hardship for the client and family. While we are often able to solve the problem, it cannot be solved instantly. For example, in Ontario, with the current backlog for mediations at the Financial Services Commission, it can be 6 months or more before your case is dealt with. Meanwhile, you are not receiving the benefits you need.

How can you reduce the risk that your time will be undervalued? Here are 5 tips.

1) Before the in-home assessment, identify every housekeeping and home maintenance task you performed before the accident. Brainstorm with family members so that you don't forget anything. If a task is shared among family members, consider how often you performed the task. No task is too small.

2) Think about how long your housekeeping tasks take. I have asked clients how long it takes them to do laundry and have been amazed by the varied responses. Remember all the elements of a task. For just one load of laundry you have to gather it from around the house, bring it to the laundry room, sort it, pre-treat stains, put the load in the washer, ad the soap set the washer, remove it from the washer, set the dryer, ad the fabric softener, lay out any clothes that don't go in the dryer, remove the clothes from the dryer, fold the laundry and distribute it in the house. Plus some clothes are ironed. Clients who say laundry takes them "5 minutes" are probably not being accurate. Before the in home assessment, do this type of analysis for all your tasks. It will add up.

3) Don't assume the assessor is being fair. We have had an assessor ask a client to hold a broom. Based on the fact that the client could hold the broom, the assessor concluded in his report that the client could sweep. If you are asked to mimic a task in a way that does not really reflect the work that task involves SAY SOMETHING. Tell the assessor: "Well I can hold a broom but I can't swing it back and forth over 500 square feet and then sweep up the dust in a dust pan and carry it to the garbage."

4) Think about the details of your personal care. Many accident victims forget that they have not washed or styled their hair since the accident or can't wear a bra after the accident due to shoulder pain. Think about the minute details like fastening buttons, cutting toe nails and donning socks. If you are getting help with these tasks from your family, or are forgoing them, make sure you let the assessor know.

5) Accept all offers of help. If the insurance company assessor suggests certain devices to help you with personal care or housekeeping, gladly accept them. Firstly, these devices will probably assist you regain some independence. Secondly, accepting help sends a clear message that you are interested in your rehabilitation.

Understanding Your Group Disability Insurance Benefits

It's amazing how many people have group Long-Term Disability insurance through their employer but understand nothing about what it provides them. When speaking of something as important as income protection, it is important for people to know what they have, and what they don't have so they can best protect themselves, their family and their future.

Before going into the details, it is best to understand what Disability insurance is and what it does. Disability insurance is a financial product used to insure a person's ability to work and earn an income. For most professionals - if you work, you get paid and if you do not work, you don't get paid. The purpose of Disability insurance is to insure that if you become unable to work due to an injury or illness, you continue to earn a percentage of your income.

So now you understand what Disability insurance is, but how does your group coverage actually work? My advice is that everyone should review his/her actual benefit package in order to get a better understanding of the plan design. Having an insurance adviser review this information with you could be helpful as well.

Every Long-Term Disability insurance contract will have an elimination period and benefit period. The elimination period is the period of time that must be satisfied before benefits will be paid and the benefit period is the maximum period of time for which benefits will be paid. Unless you work for the Government, you can expect that your group Long-Term Disability insurance benefits will include a 90-day elimination period and a benefit period payable to age 65.

One of the most important things you will want to know is the benefit amount your group plan provides. Most people can expect for their group Disability insurance benefits to equal 60% of their annual income. Higher earners should pay close attention to plan maximums however because most group plans will have a maximum benefit of $6,000/month. For someone earning over $120,000 annually, $6,000 of monthly benefit will be less than 60% coverage. Additionally, you should understand the taxation that occurs when benefits are claimed. If you pay the premiums yourself, your benefits will most likely be payable on a non-taxable basis (unless premiums are paid pre-tax). If your employer pays the premium, then you can expect that benefits will be taxable at the time of a claim. Consider this carefully, a taxable 60% benefit will actually only provide around 45% income replacement.

Another important factor to understand is how your group Disability insurance will determine your eligibility for a claim. In order to do this, we look to the Definition of Disability that your policy provides. Again, in order to truly know what your coverage provides, you should review your actual benefits package, however most people can assume that they will have an Own-Occupation definition for the first 24-36 months of a claim and an Any-Occupation definition from that point forward. This means that for the first 24-36 months, you are considered totally disabled if due to an injury or illness you are unable to perform the material duties of your regular occupation (what you are doing at the time of disability). If you remain disabled beyond the Own-Occupation period, you will be considered disabled only if due to an injury or illness you are unable to perform any occupation for which you are reasonably qualified based on education, experience or training. Essentially this means that for the first 24-36 months you are properly protected, but beyond that point, the insurance company can dispute your claim and require you to work in a different profession, if you are capable of doing it.

Hopefully, by this point you have a better understanding of how your group Disability insurance benefits work and how they are paid. So now it is important to understand some of the restrictions and limitations that exist with group Disability insurance in comparison to individual coverage.

To start, group Disability insurance benefits will offset by other benefits that you receive, such as Social Security. This means that every dollar you receive from Social Security disability will replace one dollar of your group Disability benefits. The same thing is likely to occur with income received from several other sources as well. Look in your benefits package under "other income benefits" to see the list of benefits tat will be offset.

One of the good things about group Disability insurance is that there is generally no medical underwriting, which means that everyone qualifies. For this reason, insurance companies will normally have a pre-existing condition clause that restricts the benefits paid for any condition you've been consulted or treated for within 12 months of the coverage effective date. These benefits will usually be restricted to a small percentage, about 30% of the regular benefit you would receive. Additionally, your group Disability insurance is very likely to limit benefits paid on a Mental/Nervous condition, to a 24-month benefit period.

Lastly, Group Disability insurance benefits are not transferable, meaning that if you change jobs, your benefits do not go with you. For many people this can be a very big concern because their health may not allow them to qualify for individual coverage.

Group Disability insurance benefits are nice to have, especially if your employer is paying for it. However, it should not be the only Disability insurance you have. A person's income is his/her most valuable financial asset, and without it, most people and families would suffer a severe financial hardship. Now that you understand how your group Disability insurance benefits work and also where they fall short, you should speak with an insurance advisor, have them review your group policy and see if there is an opportunity of obtaining individual coverage to supplement the gaps in your group coverage. Who knows - you may just need it down the road.