TWENTY THINGS THAT EVERYONE SHOULD BE AWARE ABOUT LIFE INSURANCE.

 

TWENTY THINGS THAT EVERYONE SHOULD BE AWARE ABOUT LIFE INSURANCE.

By, Dr. Ashok Chandran

While many of us know about Insurance, the startling fact is that India’s insurance penetration at just 3.76% of the GDP is “extremely low” against comparable Asian countries such as China, Malaysia and Thailand as well as the global average, according to the central government’s Economic Survey of 2020-21
India’s insurance penetration grew from 2.71% in 2001 to 3.76% in 2019 which is much lower than other global economies. India’s life and non-life insurance penetrations in 2019, at 2.82% and 0.94% respectively, are also significantly lower than the global average of 3.35% and 3.88%, respectively.

Insurance protection is all about staying protected for the unknown future. Your family’s protection starts with your awareness about the existence of risk and the nuances of Insurance. Here is a list of terms and things to know for choosing the right Life Insurance cover and for ensuring smooth claim settlement.

1) 100 percent disclosures in proposal, like Smoking, drinking, medical history, Income, family medical history, Covid History etc.

2) Fill and read the proposal form personally to ensure accurate data.

3) Ensure All premium payments on time.

‘Premium’ is the amount to be paid to the Insurance company to keep your policy active.

4) Update Nominee Name and address, especially if Nominee passes away.

5) In case of death, file a claim immediately without any delay.

6) Do medical check-up at the time of buying a new policy.

7) Understand Policy Clauses and Exclusions.

8) Inform your family members about your policy.

9) Keep the Policy Bond/Document safely and accessible to the family.

10) Understand, Claim settlement ratio by policies, while comparing Insurers.

11) Understand Amount settlement ratio: It is important to consider amount settlement ratio in addition to claim settlement ratio by policies, else insurers will clear low value policies and reject high value policies, and this could be misleading.

12) Claim rejection ratio:

The claim rejection ratio or claim repudiation ratio is important as the claim settlement ratio may be misleading when there are high volumes of claims under process and not rejected at the time of such calculation for a particular period.

13) Assets under management: With a larger AUM the company can invest and get better returns. A larger customer base also helps manage risks more accurately. The capacity to settle claims on time also increases.

14) Solvency ratio:

The solvency ratio is a measurement of a company's cash flow and its liabilities. In simple words, it helps you know whether or not the company has adequate funds to manage its short-term and long-term liabilities.

15) Have a Will mentioning the nominee as the beneficiary of your Insurance, especially if he is not an immediate blood relative like father, son or spouse.

16) Go with MWP option wherever appropriate.

Section 6 of the Married Women's Property Act (MWPA), 1874, provides that a policy of insurance effected by any married man on his own life and expressed on the face of it to be for the benefit of his wife, or of his wife and children, or any of them, shall ensure and be deemed to be a trust for the benefit of his wife.

MWP protects and ensures that the woman gets all the maturity proceeds independent of the financial liabilities of the Proposer.

17) Define an Insurance objective before choosing an Insurance product, like Income replacement, covering dependent family members, Insuring a family Life goal, Housing Loan liability Protection, retirement planning, corpus/pension creation, tax benefit, Interest protection, leaving behind a legacy, Pure Term/whole life/saving, etc. This helps you choose the product wisely and Insure adequately. A professional Insurance Advisor plays a key role in helping you articulate your objectives and recommending the right product as per the need analysis.

Remember that inadequate Insurance is as good as No Insurance, So Insure with a clear Objective, and not just for having some name sake Insurance.

‘Sum Assured’ is the amount to be paid by the Insurance company to the Nominee 

‘Maturity Benefit’ is the amount to be paid to the insured for surviving the policy term.

‘Policy Term’ is the period for which the policy provides life coverage.

‘Premium Paying Term’ is the period for which premium has to be paid to the insurance company.

Your clear Insurance objective helps defining the Sum Insured, Policy Term and Premium Paying Term, and Maturity Benefit.

18) The earlier you buy an Insurance policy, the cheaper it will be. Younger people get Insurance cover at a very low premium and does not feel the pinch of the premium amount.

19) Probability of getting an Insurance cover: Get Insured whenever you are healthy and eligible. The chances of getting the Insurance is higher, if one does it before age related, infection, weight related, Critical Illnesses, or lifestyle diseases come up. There are many people who are unable to Insure themselves due to various health and weight related reasons.

Save your Medical Records: Discharge Certificate in case of Hospitalisation, X-rays/Scanning Reports, Histopathology Report, Vaccination Certificates Etc. You may need them for the purpose of Insurance.

20) Choose a professional Insurance Advisor, like you choose a doctor for your family. Your Advisor helps you articulate your needs accurately and choose the best suitable product. Finally it is the Advisor who stands by your family, while you are not there, to fulfil the promise of the policy.

Review of your Insurance Portfolio atleast once in a year. Apart from the annual review consult your advisor whenever there is a major life change or significant change in circumstances.

Not Investing sufficiently is a small crime, dying without adequate Insurance cover is unpardonable and a Big lifelong punishment to the family. Insure and Be Secure.

Dr. Ashok Chandran is a full time IRDA Registered Insurance Advisor and can be reached, for Consultations and Insurance Portfolio Review, on Mobile: 9821157708 or E-mail: ashok@ac.co.in

We are on a Mission to Transform a Million Lives by 2030

Be Financially Aware: Knowledge is Power!

 

Your Wealth, Health, Job, Position, Income, Family, Knowledge, Connections, Hard Work Etc. does not guarantee you any control over life.

Life consistently throws opportunities and challenges at you.

Man has no control over Death, Disability, Disease, Disaster, Accident, Incident Etc; The financial impact of the same on your family can only be minimised, with adequate Insurance covers.

There are sure events like children's education, marriage, Buying House, Retirement Etc. for which you can have a goal based financial plan, and invest accordingly. 

Your Family's Financial Future is defined by your Financial Awareness, Financial Actions and Discipline and not by your current Income or Wealth.

Insure, Invest and Allocate Assets as per your Risk Profile & goals, and Review it with your Advisor at regular intervals.

Financial Discipline and Planning over a period of time, is the only way to Financial Independence and Freedom.

Finally, God has his own ways, But never fail to do what is in your hands, to protect yourself & your family, and to be Financially Free.

All Investments are subject to Risks, Terms & Conditions. Talk to your Advisor, Read, Understand and Be Financially Aware Before Investing.

 

Dr. Ashok Chandran

We are on a Mission to Transform a Million Lives by 2030, through Free Financial Awareness For All.

The Power of Being Discontent.

Came across this post which talks about one of the key traits that make you a great entrepreneur.

Be Happy, but Stay Hungry and Stay Discontent...Never Settle, Keep Improving, Keep Growing, Keep Innovating, Keep Progressing....Sky is not the limit, Your limits are set in your mind.

The power of being discontent.
Peyush Bansal, Lenskart

Often I meet people who congratulate me for building lenskart into a great brand & every time I hear this, only thing that is going on in my mind is “Hope buddy you knew what crisis we are in and what all is broken. Glad you do not know about our this week’s  Review where 7/8 things are pending. Thank god you are not one of the 4 customer escalations that came to me this week. You have no idea what I am going through..my Discontent :)”

This is one feeling that has not changed for me for last 10 years. Only thing that has changed is that earlier when my well wishers (family, HR, seniors) used to criticise me for having this feeling, I used to feel bad, and now I don’t :)

I have come to realise that BEING DISCONTENT is a Big Value in building an ever evolving, ever surprising, ever growing…customer centric organisation. And being discontent has nothing to do with being happy, but it has everything to do with what we will be 3 years from now….it is a way of being, of improving, of pushing to BE MORE and DO MORE every day, and yet being happy:)

I am not saying I am not appreciative of what we have done as a team so far and hard work put in, but I am also saying, it is not such a bad thing if…

Every time I meet a customer who is happy with lenskart, I thank god :) and my team and every time I meet a dissatisfied one, I am filled with frustration & shooting emails!…if every time I meet an entrepreneur who is telling me what all amazing stuff they are doing such as 10 min delivery to sustainability to AI, I feel “oh my god, we are so far behind”. And every time I speak to an AMEX representative, I feel “why are we not yet delivering the same service”. And every time I am browsing an amazing experience on a new app, I am “taking screenshots and whatsapping them to my product team:)”. It is not such a bad thing if every night I go to sleep thinking “how much more is left to do …”

In my view all entrepreneurs are discontent, else they would never have become entrepreneurs. And organisations need more entrepreneurs to grow i.e. more discontent :) It is this discontent that pushes us every day to do better & deliver more & more ….

Apple releases a software update every 15 days and each update has 100s of new small features which make customer experience better….and by doing this it has become a 3 Trillion Dollar company (larger than the GDP of India). If they were so content, they would not be doing this …

“Good is not good enough” i.e. what is good today will not be good tomorrow. And BEING DISCONTENT allows us to stay humble, stay curious, stay hungry to continuously push ourselves to innovate and build an organisation for tomorrow, not just today.

Thank you lenskart team for being discontent always, despite accomplishing so much…we have a long way to go and it is still Day1

And cheers to all the Discontent yet Happy people in the world…let’s  keep doing more and being more !

Patience is the essence of Life.

Patience is the essence of Life.

A Teacher gave a beautiful toffee to all the children of the class and then said a strange thing...

 Listen, children! All of you not to eat  your toffee for ten minutes and saying that he walked out of the class room.

There was silence in the classroom for a few moments, every child was looking at the toffee in front of them and it was difficult to stop themselves with each passing moment. Ten minutes are over and the teacher enters the  class room. Reviewed. There were seven children in the whole class, whose toffees  were as it is, while all the other children were eating toffee and commenting on its color and taste. The teacher secretly recorded the names of these seven children in his diary and began to read after noting.

The name of this teacher was Professor Walter Torch.

After a few years, Professor Walter opened his own diary and removed the names of seven children and started researching them. After a long struggle, he came to know that the seven children have achieved many successes in their lives and are the most successful among their own field people. Professor Walter also reviewed the rest of his class of students and it was found that most of them were leading a normal life, while there were some who were faced with strict economic and social conditions.

All this effort and research resulted in one sentence by Professor Walter and that was it.

"A man who cannot be patient for ten minutes can never move forward in life"

This research gained worldwide prominence and was named "Marsh Mello Theory" because the toffee that Professor Walter gave the children was named "Marsh Mello". It was soft like foam.

 According to this theory, one of the most successful people in the world are found with special qualitiy of 'patience', because this quality increases the strength of the human being, due to which the man is not disappointed in difficult situations and he becomes an extraordinary personality.

Patience is the essence of life.

You are your Word.

You are your Word.

Why did you tell lies yesterday?

No, I’m not accusing you of anything. But you did lie. You told someone you’ll call them back in 5 minutes and you didn’t. You told yourself that you’ll wake up early to meditate, and you didn’t. What other “lie” did you tell yourself or others?

You thought there would be no consequences. No repercussions. What difference does it make if I call someone in 20 minutes, instead of 5? What difference does it make that I told my friend that I’m already in the taxi on my way, while I was really just leaving the house?

Well, I hate to be the one to break it to you, but you’ve just sabotaged your own communication with the Universe.

Believe it or not, the Universe is hanging on your every word, and every time you say something that you don’t intend to fulfil, your words lose power. And when the time comes to tell the Universe what you really want, it doesn’t believe you. It thinks that you’re just say these words casually without any actual commitment behind it.

This is the second Yama  of Patanjali: Non-Lying ( Asatya). Which isn’t lying in the traditional sense of the word, but to use and choose your words carefully so that you don’t cripple their power. When you say something and then act in accordance to what you said, you strengthen their power. Patanjali says that once you’ve mastered this quality, your every word has the power to create reality, even to the point that the Universe will have to rearrange itself to align with your words . This is the secret behind the miracles performed by saints; when they heal someone, or change people’s circumstances merely by saying it is so.

When you align with Truth, then Life itself aligns with you, and turns your words into mantras.

In the beginning, to practice this virtue, start every day by consciously measuring your words. If you say you’ll be there in 5 minutes, make sure you are, otherwise don’t say it. As you practice this you will realise how careless we tend to be with our words, and how casually we use them.

Power of Silence

Power of Silence

There once was a farmer who discovered that he had lost his watch in the barn. It was no ordinary watch because it had sentimental value for him.

After searching high and low among the hay for a long while; he gave up and enlisted the help of a group of children playing outside the barn.

He promised them that the person who found it would be rewarded.

Hearing this, the children hurried inside the barn, went through and around the entire stack of hay but still could not find the watch. Just when the farmer was about to give up looking for his watch, a little boy went up to him and asked to be given another chance.

The farmer looked at him and thought, “Why not? After all, this kid looks sincere enough.”

So the farmer sent the little boy back in the barn. After a while the little boy came out with the watch in his hand! The farmer was both happy and surprised and so he asked the boy how he succeeded where the rest had failed.

The boy replied, “I did nothing but sit on the ground and listen. In the silence, I heard the ticking of the watch and just looked for it in that direction.”

A peaceful mind can think better than a worked up mind. Allow a few minutes of silence to your mind every day, and see, how sharply it helps you to set your life the way you expect it to.

Suffering cannot survive in the NOW.

Suffering cannot survive in the NOW.

The whole essence of Zen consists in walking along the razor's edge of Now... to be so utterly, so completely present that no problem, no suffering, nothing that is not who you are in your essence, can survive in you. In the Now, in the absence of time, all your problems dissolve.

Suffering needs time; it cannot survive in the Now.
~Eckhart Tolle

Every Suffering is a Buddha seed.

If there was no suffering in your life, you will be comfortably sleeping and there would have been no possibility for you to awaken. That's why nature allows suffering & pain for you to Awake spiritually! This is part of our evolution. There is great potential in us. Life is Great 😁🙏

Types of Teachers in Sanskrit.

Sanskrit words for 'teacher' based on their unique abilities...

1. The teacher who gives you information is called: Adhyapak

2. The one who imparts knowledge combined with information is called: Upadhyaya

3. The one who imparts skills is called: Acharya

4. The one who is able to give a deep insight into a subject is called: Pundit

5. The one who has a visionary view on a subject and teaches you to think in that manner is called: Dhrishta

6. The one who is able to awaken wisdom in you, leading you from darkness to light, is called: Guru

Sanskrit is perhaps the only language that has such a refined vocabulary to distinguish the different kinds of teachers.

What is Meditation?

What is meditation?

This was a question haunting a small boy. His parents were  at wit's end, as they could not explain it in a simple language the boy could comprehend.

Once the family went for a dharshan to Shri Ramana Maharishi. The boy put forward his question to Ramana Maharishi.

Shri Ramana laughed to himself. Then with smiling face, he asked his devotee to serve  the boy dosa from the kitchen.

So, on a plain leaf, a dosa was served. Shri Ramana looked at the boy and said,
" Now I will say "Hmm"
Then only you should start eating. Then again I will say "hmm" After that no piece of dosa should be left on your plate."
The boy agreed. He was so excited. Others were watching expectantly.  Now the boy  was eagerly waiting for the signal by looking at Shri Ramana's face. When he gave the signal "hmm" the boy started eating. Now his attention was on Shri Ramana. He wanted to finish dosa before the signal. The boy was eating dosa in a hurry , tearing big chunks of dosa,  but, all the time keeping his attention on Shri Ramana. The dosa was reducing in size gradually. There was a small piece left. The boy was looking anxiously  at Shri Ramana for the second signal. The moment he gave the  signal, the boy immediately put the dosa in his mouth.

Now Shri Ramana asked him " where was your attention till now? On me or on Dosa?"

The boy replied " On both"

Shri Ramana said" Yes. You were actively involved in finishing dosa, with your attention on me. You were not distracted at all.
Like this when you do your daily activities with your attention or thoughts  on God in the back ground, it is known as meditation."

The two signals "hmm" are birth & death. Within these two events, one can engage in meditation, as demonstrated by Shri Ramana Maharishi. But to understand this we all need divine grace to mellow & mature. We all differ from each other and hence take different time to comprehend this great truth.

Story of Sylvester Stalonne, Rocky Balboa.

Sylvester Stallone is one of the most famous American Movie stars.. With characters like Rocky and Rambo he is a household name in the hearts of millions.

During birth, a wrong gynecological procedure caused Stallone to have one sided paralysis. At school, his middle class being and his facial paralysis became a thing for others to make fun of.

He started body-building because he wanted to frighten those who bullied him. Slowly he started thinking of a career in movies.

Around 1974, he had a pregnant wife, a dog that he loved a lot, a lot of bills to pay and no success in his movie career.

What he still had was a belief in his dream that he will make it big.

Soon a time came when he went broke. He was heavily under debt.

Restless, anxious, stressed and still loaded with hope that he WILL make it big.

Things got so bad that he had to sell his wife’s jewelry and ended up homeless. Sleeping at the New York Bus station for 3 days.

The cold American winter forced him to choose between electricity and his dog. He stood outside a local store and sold his dog for $25.

Two weeks later, on TV he watched a boxing match between Mohammed Ali and Chuck Wepner. That match was like a flash of divine inspiration… For the next 20 hours he sat and wrote the script of what today is a cult movie, ROCKY.

In the words of Stallone himself, “After nearly 1500 rejections”,  he got a production house to offer $125,000 for the script.

Despite the poverty, pains, pregnant wife and lost dog… His dream was to STAR in the movie  as the MAIN LEAD.

In an era when heroes were super handsome men and spoke fluently, a body builder with a facial paralysis that made him stammer while speaking, made Stallone the wrong choice for any role.

The studio bluntly rejected his offer… And Stallone went back home with another failure.

A few weeks later,the studio offered him  $250,000 for the just the script, and not him.

He refused.

Soon they offered  $350,000 for the script but not him.

At that time everyone was pushing him to accept.. It would be MAD not to do so.. He was making a fortune.

He still refused.

Someone in the studio really loved his script, and as fortune favors the brave.. They finally accepted to give $35,000 for the script and have him as the lead star.

The rest as they say is history!

The movie was made for $1 million and went to make around $200 million.

It won the Oscar for Best Picture, Best Direction and Best Film Editing.

Stallone was a “bankable” hero for the next 20yrs, till the late 90s… with his movies making billions of dollars.

And what did he do with the first $35,000?

He stood outside the liquor store, where he sold his dog, for 3 days. Identified the man who had bought it, and finally got him back for $15,000.

AND IN THE WORDS OF ROCKY BALBOA –
“Let me tell you something you already know. The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s a very mean and nasty place and I don’t care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard ya hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done!”
― Sylvester Stallone, Rocky Balboa