Employee benefits open enrollment can be confusing for a lot of people. There are a lot of options to choose from that probably seem like they’re in a different language. My past 5 blog posts have dived into various employee benefits including health insurance, disability insurance, group term life insurance, Dependent Care FSA, and other ancillary benefits to help empower you to make a more educated decision when making your selections for the next year. Personal finance is just that – personal.
Life Insurance
Guide to Employee Benefits Open Enrollment 2020: Group Term Life Insurance
7 minute read
Group term life insurance is a very common employee benefit that many people take advantage of. However, not many people think beyond the scope of the coverage offered through their employee benefits to consider why they need the coverage, how long they’ll need it, and if the maximum amount they can get is enough. If there are people who depend on your income who would be financially devastated if something were to happen to you, then group term life insurance is a benefit that you should seriously consider.
Day 22 Of 30 Days Of Stay-At-Home Personal Finance Wins: Review Your Insurance Policies
4 minute read
What if you were able to come out of this time of social distancing and economic crisis with a stronger and healthier financial life? What if you looked at this as an opportunity to take a little bit of your extra time each day to work on your finances?
Guide to Employee Benefits Open Enrollment 2019 Part 3: Group Term Life Insurance
5 minute read
Group term life insurance is a very common employee benefit that many people take advantage of. However, not many people think beyond the scope of the coverage offered through their employee benefits to consider why they need the coverage, how long they’ll need it, and if the maximum amount they can get is enough. If there are people who depend on your income and would be financially devastated if something were to happen to you, then this is a benefit that you should be taking more seriously.
Don’t Lose Your Insurance
2 minute read
Have you ever thought about what would happen to the life and disability insurance coverages that you have through your employer if you quit your job, found new employment, started your own business, were fired, or retired? They’d probably be gone, right? And your family would be left unprotected.
The coverages don’t go away in every situation, but most of the time they will. Some employers do allow you to take your policies with you, but you usually have to be willing to pay the full price of the coverage without any of the subsidization that your employer was previously providing.
Having private insurance policies can be beneficial to those who need them because they remain portable no matter where you work, or if you work. As long as you continue paying the premiums, your coverage will continue.
Portability
Private insurance is something to look in to as you begin looking at your open enrollment options. Do you really want to have all of your life and disability insurance tied to your employment? If something were to happen to your employer and they had to terminate your position, then you’d be left without coverage. Maybe you want to quit your job to travel the world, start your own business, or you’re switching to a new employer that doesn’t offer insurance benefits.
You’ve got a mortgage, a family to support, and you’ve lost your insurance benefits that go along with the job that you no longer have. If something were to happen to you it would now be up to your spouse (or whoever that would be in your situation) to figure out how to pay the mortgage, run the household, and get the kids through school and extracurriculars. That would be pretty tough without any funds to support them through this.
Medical Underwriting
Having private insurance can help you eliminate any chance of something like this happening. If you get private insurance wen you’re young and healthy, then you’ll never have to go back through medical underwriting again when you’re older and potentially have developed health issues, unless you need additional coverage or a longer term. The insurance policy will last as long as the term states, if you pay your premiums. Some people end up paying astronomically for life and disability insurance because they have to go through medical underwriting at a later age when they lose their employer-provided policies or realize that they need some coverage in place. They could probably have eliminated the higher costs by getting insured at an earlier age.
Independent Agent
As you go through the benefits offered to you during open enrollment and determine the amount of life and disability insurance coverages that you need, consider comparing the costs and benefits of private policies versus those of your employer-provided policies. As always, I recommend working with an independent insurance agent who can obtain quotes from you from many different insurance companies rather than only being able to write policies from their employer.
The big insurance companies that you see advertised everywhere (you know who they are) will almost always cost more because they spend so much on advertising and other things that smaller companies don’t. Additionally, agents of these companies are limited to selling you products from their employer rather than being able to shop rates from multiple different insurers for you. An independent agent can actually work to find the cheapest policy for you that provides the benefits that you need because they can run quotes from multiple companies and compare policies.
