What TPD insurance costs

Total and permanent disablement cover pays a lump sum if illness or injury leaves you permanently unable to work. Because a claim requires permanence, TPD claims are less frequent than trauma claims and the premium sits between life cover and trauma cover for most people.

What makes TPD pricing unusual is how much the definition moves the number. Own occupation cover pays if you can never work in your own occupation again. Any occupation cover pays only if you can never work in any job you are reasonably suited to. The second is a far higher bar, far less likely to be met, and therefore much cheaper.

That is why a TPD quote without its definition attached is not information. It is a price for an unknown promise.

Comparing quotes properly

Before you compare two TPD premiums, check three things: the definition, whether it is standalone or accelerated, and whether the definition changes at a set age. If any of those differ, the cheaper quote may simply be the smaller promise.

These are the details that decide whether the cover does what you expected. Read them before you compare on price.

• Which definition you are being quoted, and whether it is available for your occupation.
• Whether the definition switches to any occupation at 60 or 65.
• Whether the cover is standalone or accelerated against life cover.
• The insurer’s maximum TPD sum insured, which is often below its life cover maximum.
• How the waiting period works and what evidence is needed to establish permanence.
• For non-earners, whether a home duties definition is available and what it caps at.

Every New Zealand insurer writes what life insurance costs in nz to its own wording, and the words are where the money is. Two policies that look identical on price can pay very differently when it matters. Closing that gap is the entire job of an adviser.

• Whether own occupation cover is available to you at all depends on how the insurer classes your job, and classifications differ.
• The wording of an any occupation definition varies enough between insurers to change the outcome of a claim.
• Splitting cover between TPD and trauma often protects a household better than putting everything into one benefit.
• TPD claims are assessed on medical and vocational evidence, and an adviser who has run them knows what that involves.

There are three ways to buy life cover in New Zealand, and they are not equivalent. You can buy direct from one insurer, which means you see one product range and one underwriting appetite. You can buy through your bank, which usually means a single insurer’s product sold under the bank’s brand, often with narrower definitions. Or you can go through an adviser, who quotes several insurers at once and is required to put your interests first.

The premium you pay is the same either way. Insurers build adviser commission into their pricing whether or not an adviser is involved, so going direct does not get you a discount — it just removes the person whose job is to argue your corner at application and at claim time.

• An adviser can see which insurer is currently taking your health history on standard terms, and which one will load or exclude it.
• An adviser can structure cover across two insurers if that produces a better outcome than putting everything with one.
• An adviser handles the underwriting back-and-forth, and is the person who chases the claim when a family is least able to.
• An adviser has to document why the recommendation suits you, which is a written record you can hold them to.

We are a referral service, not an insurer. We do not quote premiums and we do not sell policies. What we do is put you in front of one licensed New Zealand adviser who can compare the market properly.

1. 1

   You tell us what you are looking at

   The form takes about a minute. Nobody asks for your medical history on a web form — that conversation happens with the adviser, properly, and only once you have decided to proceed.

2. 2

   An adviser calls you

   A licensed New Zealand adviser talks through your situation: who depends on you, what you owe, what you already have in place, and what you are actually worried about.

3. 3

   They compare the market

   The adviser quotes across the major insurers, checks which of them will take your health history on the best terms, and puts the options side by side in writing.

4. 4

   You decide, in your own time

   There is no obligation and no cost to you. If the answer is that you already have enough cover, a good adviser will tell you that.