Why life insurance should be called ‘Love insurance’

The ultimate measure of the love you have for your family lies not in spending a lot of money on them, but in securing them from harm forever.

What have you done to prove your love for your family?

• Taken them on a foreign vacation every year
• Purchased a big house recently
• Bought expensive gadgets, jewellery, clothes
• All of the above

Most people would like to select Option 4, but have succeeded in at least one of the others. What if we told you that the most important option is not even included in the list?

We’re referring to a wonderful instrument known as the ‘life insurance policy’. It is a way of safeguarding your and your family’s financial future against every kind of setback, including your absence from their lives. At maturity, it provides a large fund of money that can take care of a variety of expenses, right from paying for a second home, funding your children’s education and wedding and even settling your parents in a nest egg of their own.

So why should you buy a life insurance plan?

1. Because you care for your family. Your family comprises you, your spouse, children and dependent parents. All of them are equally important to you, and their collective future is in your hands. Just imagine a future when you are absent from their lives. Will they be able to sustain their lives as they do now? Can the household expenses go on as before? If not, you need life insurance to take care of them when you are absent.
2. Because you may have borrowings. A lot of people need to borrow loans at some point in their lives. The loan may be personal (to buy a home, to pay for children’s education, etc.) or professional in nature (to buy office space, to open a new office in another city, etc.) At the moment, the loans are repaid through monthly EMIs. But what happens in the future when your income stops and the loans are still unpaid? How will your loved ones deal with creditors who come asking for their money? A life insurance plan provides the corpus to repay these debts.
3. Because you are committed to your family’s dreams. Your family has every right to dream big. Your children may plan to settle in a foreign location, your spouse may want to travel all over the country and your parents may want to have a separate retirement abode of their own. Making these dreams come true is your responsibility. You can do so only with adequate planning for the future. Your life insurance plan can pay for all these dreams and make your family the happiest one in the world!

Are you looking for a life insurance company? Trust only BSLI

Birla Sun Life Insurance’s plans offer varied and all-encompassing benefits to customers.

The only constant in life is change. We plan a certain path for our lives – we get a good education, get employed, work hard for our families, make a large amount of money and retire in style. But how often does life follow this script? There have been numerous instances of life changing in one instant – one minute a person may be hale and hearty, and the next moment he may stare at untold sadness.

Thus, it is clear that life is highly unpredictable. It can alter the entire course of our existence in the blink of an eye. But while you may bear any and every hardship with fortitude, what about your loved ones? Will they be able to stand up to financial problems in your absence? Will your absence insulate them from the pitfalls arising from a loss of income?

If you fear such a fate for your loved ones, the solution is obvious: taking a good life insurance plan that covers you and your loved ones.

Selecting the best life insurance policy in India

For all intents and purposes, the life plan you choose depends on your future requirements and must be adjusted for future inflation. The sum assured must be more than adequate to meet your needs, while the insurer you choose must have an impeccable reputation and an excellent track record in settling claims quickly.

We recommend zeroing in on Birla Sun Life Insurance (BSLI) for your life insurance needs. Not only is the company a trusted partner in the insurance space with the reputation of featuring amongst the premier life insurance companies in India, it also offers an array of excellent insurance options that take a gamut of eventualities into account. Besides, BSLI offers customers the chance to create savings, make sound investments and get excellent returns while also receiving life coverage. BSLI’s life insurance plans are covered under:

1. Protection: These comprise a range of excellent term plans to protect your family’s future.
2. Savings with Protection: These offer the component of financial protection as also the opportunity to create a large savings corpus for the future.
3. Children’s Future: These comprise child insurance plans that ensure the fruition of your children’s many dreams.
4. Retirement: Pension and annuity plans are featured in this category, nudging customers towards planning their retirement in a systematic manner.
5. Health and Wellness: BSLI offers exceptional health insurance plans that also provide valuable riders for critical illness and a host of mediclaim benefits.
6. Wealth with Protection: BSLI offers tangible solutions for wealth creation by providing instruments for investment while offering valuable life coverage and steady returns.

The biggest reason to take life insurance

Is your salary your family’s sole source of income? If it does, then you need to take life insurance as soon as possible.

It may sound like a cliché, but it is true that the only constant in life is change. Many times, life does not follow the trajectory we set out for it. We imagine a certain kind of future: good job, a house, children attending good schools, a stable retirement. But how many times do things pan out exactly in the same course? Life has a way of suddenly altering the course of our destinies, and there is nothing one can do about it.

A person may be out for dinner with friends, and suddenly suffer cardiac arrest. Another might be walking home and suffer a fatal accident while crossing the road. The point is, life is full of unexpected shocks and surprises. One might be happy and hearty one moment, and the next moment might bring untold grief. One cannot predict what the next minute will bring.

Imagine if this were your life’s story. As the sole earning member of the family, it is your responsibility to ensure that your family’s every need is taken care of. You are aware of the tremendous burden you carry on your shoulders: your family is solely dependent on your income, and you cannot jeopardise them in any way. This means that you must be in the prime of health every day, and be around for your family forever.

Except, nobody is around forever. What happens when you are absent from your family’s life? How will your loved ones manage their household expenses, children’s education costs, medical expenses, etc.? These and other expense heads can be taken care of by the simple expedient of purchasing life insurance.

Life insurance plans make fiscal sense on many levels. They safeguard your family against an uncertain future in your absence. Despite your best efforts, your salary may not allow you to save money diligently every month or make investments. Hence, if there isn’t a lot of money in your savings account, your family is bound to suffer from financial shocks in your absence. However, a life insurance policy provides a large corpus of money to see your family through all its financial needs.

Life insurance companies in India offer you the option to purchase life insurance plans that provide for your family upon your unfortunate demise. Your loved ones receive the sum assured in a lump sum amount – this can be used to pay for children’s education, emergency medical expenses, unpaid liabilities like home loans, etc. Your life insurance policy helps keep your family protected from penury and harassment from creditors. 

Isn’t that what you’ve always wanted to ensure, your family’s safety and protection? Get it with life insurance

Life Insurance is Something that You Can't Ignore

On March 12, 2015, the Government of India passed an Amendment to the Insurance Laws Bill, increasing the FDI limit within the Indian insurance sector from 26% to 49%. According to Timetric’s report, “Life Insurance in India, Key Trends and Opportunities to 2019,” this increased FDI allowance is likely to attract global insurers to the country, intensifying competition within the industry. This can only mean good news of buyers of life insurance in India. In the race to win customers, insurers are likely to try to outdo each other in the benefits they offer policy holders, while lowering premium amounts. There could never have been a better time to invest in protection for yourself and your loved ones. Here are some more reasons why life cover is one investment you should not ignore.

Does Life Insurance Really Help?

While most of us are aware of the death benefits that life insurance plans offer, the reality is that such cover also offers a lot of advantages for the living.

·         Tax Benefits: Buying whole life or term cover is an excellent way to save on taxes. The premiums you pay are tax deductible under Section 80c of the Income Tax Act to a maximum of Rs 1.5 lakhs. Maturity benefits are also tax free under Section 10(10D) and Section 10(10A)(iii) of the Income Tax Act of India.

·         Retirement Planning: If you want to continue to maintain your standard of living even when you are no longer actively employed, you need to start planning early and build a corpus. A life insurance policy can help you with disciplined savings for life after retirement. You pay the premiums while you earn and reap the benefits post retirement.

·         Diversifying your Investment Portfolio: With a good mix of high, low and medium risk investment vehicles, you can be sure that you have a well balanced portfolio that can withstand even a volatile economy and the ups and downs of the markets. For those with lower risk appetite, life cover could be a good option to add to one’s investment portfolio.

·         Loans and Loan Repayment: Did you know that you can use your policy as collateral when you apply for a loan? So, not only does life insurance in India help you save, it can help you get funds when you need it the most. In addition, this is one investment instrument that can also help you repay for loans or help your family repay any debt that may outlive you.

·         Peace of Mind: Not only for you but also for your loved ones, knowing that you have planned ahead to ensure that the family remains financially secure even under the most unfortunate circumstances can do a lot to relieve stress. It also works wonders on strengthening the bond in relationships, knowing that you care enough to make sure that even when you aren’t there to take care of them, you will actually be taking care of them through a good policy.

The gains on life insurance explained

Taking life insurance in today’s turbulent times is not just an intelligent move, it is an essential one. All we have any reasonable control over is our present. The future may bring with it tremendous joys in the form of our children topping their schools and college exams, an unexpected windfall or even a surprise trip to Europe on your 50^th birthday. But the future can also come with tremendous lows, such as the unexpected death of a loved one or the loss of a stable job.

But life insurance can, if not entirely pre-empt, considerably nullify the effects of these future calamities. By playing the insurance game intelligently, you can make your life insurance policy work for you at maturity. Here’s how:

* Choose a maturity date based on future life goals. At your current position in life, you may be looking at financing your child’s foreign education 15 years hence. Or you may be at a mid-career phase and looking to retire in 10 years. Are you certain that you will have enough financial resources to mark these major milestones? If not, you can choose life insurance plans for 10, 15 or 20 years that provide a large corpus on maturity, just in time to send your child to college or for you to set funds aside for your retirement.

* The plan can finance future dreams. In the race of life, you may need to sacrifice your own small joys to help your loved ones realise their dreams. At the start of one’s career, especially, one does not have a very high salary to finance such activities as annual vacations and regular expensive purchases. But a life insurance policy maturing after a certain number of years can provide the money to finance the dreams you are putting off for later.

* Your loved ones are cared for even in your absence. The best laid plans can go awry in the case of your unfortunate demise. Your endowment life insurance takes away the worry of future financial insecurity. If the policy holder passes away before the policy matures, the death benefits accrued over the policy are passed on to the holder’s family. So whether you are present in their life or not, your loved ones are assured of a stable living.

* It creates a sizeable corpus for parents. Our parents sacrifice everything to raise us, and they continue to give their time and effort even when they are in their autumn years. Taking life insurance plans in their name for a certain number of years can guarantee a corpus for them when the policy matures. They need not depend on anybody for their upkeep in their old age – the policy you take in their name will keep them in good stead.

Despite the many advantages of investing in life insurance in India, several people continue to subsist without it. Not taking life insurance is like living with a constant threat of financial insecurity every day. Unless you have a lot of money saved up in the bank and have some high yield investments, your family is completely unprotected against future monetary shocks. In your absence, your loved ones are left to fend for themselves – and it’s a cruel world out there. Instead, taking life insurance plans is the way forward.