Life insurance when you are expecting

The instinct is to wait — get through the birth, then sort the insurance out. Financially that is backwards. The period when your household is most exposed is exactly the period you are proposing to spend uninsured, and any complication that appears between now and then becomes something you have to disclose.

For life cover the practical position is simple. Insurers underwrite the life, and a straightforward pregnancy does not change the mortality assessment in a way that affects your rates. You answer the questions honestly, including that you are pregnant, and the application proceeds.

Disability cover behaves differently. Income protection insures your ability to earn, and pregnancy leads predictably to a period of not earning. Trauma cover names conditions, some of which — certain cardiac and neurological events — can be triggered by pregnancy complications. So insurers manage that risk with time-limited deferrals or pregnancy-related exclusions rather than by declining the application.

The outcome is insurer-specific and changes, but the shape of it is consistent across the New Zealand market. What follows is the pattern an adviser expects to see, not a guarantee of any insurer’s decision.

Complications you will be asked about

Gestational diabetes is the common one. It usually resolves after birth, but it raises the statistical risk of type 2 diabetes later, so insurers ask about it years afterwards and some apply a small loading or an exclusion until enough time has passed with normal results. Pre-eclampsia and gestational hypertension are treated similarly on the disability side.

Postnatal depression is disclosable and is assessed like any other mental health history — treatment, duration, recovery, whether it recurred. Insurers vary a great deal here, and a history that one insurer excludes another may accept on standard terms after a settled period. That variation is the single strongest argument for applying through someone who quotes more than one insurer.

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

• Whether a pregnancy exclusion on income protection or trauma is time-limited or permanent — this varies and it is worth asking for in writing.
• Whether the policy includes a benefit that automatically covers a newborn for a limited period.
• Whether an IVF or fertility history has been disclosed, since it is separately relevant to underwriting.
• That any deferral has an end date you have diarised, and that you go back and remove it.
• Whether income protection is agreed value or indemnity, if you will be out of the workforce and your income at claim time may be lower.

Every New Zealand insurer writes cover applied for during pregnancy 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.

• Knowing which insurers currently apply the shortest deferral periods for pregnancy is live market knowledge, not something you can read off a website.
• Sequencing the application so life cover goes in force now and disability cover is submitted at the point most likely to produce clean terms.
• Going back after the birth to have a deferral or exclusion reviewed and, where possible, removed.
• Handling the disclosure of a complication so it is presented with the full clinical picture rather than as a single alarming line.

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.