Zurich Critical Illness Plan
Zurich has introduced more changes to its existing CI plans. The changes include two new additions to 100% conditions:
Cardiac arrest. Pays the full sum insured when treated by a defibrillator.
Corticobasal ganglionic degeneration; Diffuse Lewy body disease; Parkinsonism-Dementia-Amyotrophic. These three neurological conditions pay the full sum insured on a definite diagnosis with permanent impairment of motor function, eye movement disorder, postural instability or diagnosis of dementia.
New additional payment conditions have been added too for:
Brain abscess.
Cerebral arteriovenous malformation.
Liver resection.
Lobectomy.
Syringomelia or syringobulbia.
Third degree burns – minimum 5% to body or 19% to face.
Changes (improvements) have also been made to the definitions for:
Blindness.
Cancer.
Coronary artery bypass surgery.
Deafness.
Heart attack.
Heart valve repair/replacement.
Loss of limb.
Multiple sclerosis.
Paralysis.
In total, Zurich now covers 58 conditions and has increased the number of ABVI+ definitions to 18 (including for the top four claims: heart attack, stroke, cancer and MS). The number of additional payments has also been doubled, from six to 12. These pay out 20% of the sum insured, up to a maximum payout of £15,000.
The changes follow improvements to Zurich’s claims procedures, which has resulted in claim turnround times reducing by a quarter.
Comment: Yet more CI ‘improvements’? Yes, and it’s all good news, except for those who would like to see CI becoming much simpler. Zurich has added new conditions and improved others, all in the aim of improving or maintaining competitiveness.
The bottom line is that more people will now be able to claim than before – which must be good news. The downside is CI’s ever more complex definitions, the meaningless of ‘ABI+’ (it only tells us the definition is better than the ABI standard, but not by how much) and any form of quantification of how many more people per thousand customers are now likely to claim.
That said, we welcome the changes.
Plus points: New conditions added; A number of existing conditions improved; 58 conditions now covered in total, of which 12 are additional and 18 are ABI+; The changes should help ensure Zurich remains competitive in the CI market; Earlier improvements to claims handling.
Not so plus points: CI definition lists get ever longer; Customers don’t understand what is and what is not covered; Some changes will result in very few extra claims being paid.
Website: http://www.zurich.co.uk.
Rating (max 10): Innovation: 8. Overall: 8. Gold
Tags: CI; Zurich