Following on from our previous blog post regarding Diabetes Mellitus, we would like to clarify that in the case of Type 2 Diabetes, in general insurers do not pay out upon diagnosis of this condition, the insured is required to display severe complications such as irreversible retinopathy, diabetic gangrene and/or neuropathy to be eligible for a claim payment. Type 1 is less defined, but most insurers offer partial payments upon diagnosis once the insured person is over 30. We have therefore renamed this item to “Severe Diabetes” to reflect these related complications. 

We value getting your feedback on how these wordings are being applied to claims you may be aware of. Please email us with details of any recent claims to help us update our understanding. 

Doreen Dutt, Research Analyst, Quality Product Research Limited, researcher@qpresearch.co.nz

The Economist has this article on suicide. With New Zealand's relatively high rate (substantially higher than in the UK) we could do with some change.

One of the great things about conferences is getting to spend time with people not routinely available. Peter Sobels runs RiskInfo.com.au, which has recently established riskinfonz.co.nz. Peter was also a speaker on our panel on customer engagement.

Peter Sobels has worked in the financial services industry for thirty years, working with life insurance companies and research groups. In 2008 he founded Riskinfo as a dedicated online news and information resource for the Australian life insurance and financial services industry, particularly for advisers.

RiskinfoNZ was launched earlier this year, with similar aims to serve the news and information needs of all financial advisers, but particularly risk-focussed advisers, operating in the New Zealand financial services market.

The centre of most problems to do with money is risk. Often money books consign risk to the margins. They assume that investing is natural and only worry about investment risk. But if there were no risks at all you wouldn't invest? Investing is just a posh word for 'saving for a rainy day'. The rain is the risk - or probability - that you will need some money for when you can't work. I know saving for a boat, or to start a new business, can be a driver, but we have a vast KiwiSaver industry, and a vast insurance industry, while the 'saving for the boat' industry is smaller. So very few of us manage to live happily in poverty for long, so most of us strive for a measure of financial security. Why? Because you care.