What is life insurance?

Life Insurance policies pay out a lump sum of money on a death of a policyholder with the sum insured based upon a number of factors. This insurance can provide financial security to you and your family should you pass away.

In most cases there are two main types of life insurance:

- Whole Life insurance - can be referred to as “whole of life assurance”, a protection that is designed to cover you for your whole life and at any point should you pass away a cash lump sum would be paid.

- Term life insurance - which can be known as term assurance is life insurance that provides coverage at a fixed rate of payments for a limited period of time. If the life insured dies during the term, the death benefit would be paid to the beneficiary.

Do I need life insurance?

This would depend on your circumstances and if people depend on you financially then life insurance is a way of helping to protect them.

A consideration should be made that if something happened to you, could your family manage? Questions like how much money would they need to cover childcare, household bills, loans & mortgages should be asked. Having the correct cover in place can give you peace of mind knowing that everything is protected financially.

A financial adviser can help you identify if cover is required, how much the premiums would be and search the whole of the market for the most suitable cover.