FRIENDS PROVIDENT
No exclusions on Life or Critical Illness policies in respect of death/illness/injury due to terrorist attacks.
Note: This applies both to firefighters specifically as a result of dealing with terrorist incidents and to their customer base using these products as a whole.
SCOTTISH WIDOWS
There are no blanket exclusions for terrorist incidents. SW will payout on all valid claims from any member of the emergency services in the event of death or serious injury directly/indirectly related to a terrorist attack.
DIRECT LINE LIFE INSURANCE
Would pay out on all individual term insurance contracts if an individual dies as a result of terrorist attack including critical illness if the insured met the satisfying criteria.
DLL underwrite life cover for certain payment protection insurances and would adopt a very sympathetic approach if any such claim were received.
AXA
Would payout on protection account plans where there are no “war risk” or “terrorist” exclusions?
Existing policies that cover income protection, permanent disability etc would be viewed very sympathetically as above and would not expect to be out of line with the common industry approach to this issue.
New policies covering income protection would not be offered to firefighters.
Zurich Assurance Ltd
Life plans written by Zurich Assurance Ltd, formerly Allied Dunbar, do not have an automatic exclusion for death as a result of terrorist activity. Confirmed that any firefighter killed in such circumstances would be covered in full, subject to usual claim requirements.
On critical illness, income protection, payment protection and waiver of payment benefit there is a standard exclusion. However, Zurich does not envisage any problems with making payment to a firefighter for any claim arising from the circumstances described in the question we asked.
Scottish Equitable, Group Protection Business Unit
This particular response relates to group policies taken out by companies, not individuals.
In general, the nature of the risk attached to occupations is assessed when the risk is priced and terms are offered. The fire service does have an occupational hazard not present in most industries and so this does mean that we will respond with either a higher price, more restrictive terms or possibly no terms at all. The likelihood of the risk being declined by us is significantly higher for this occupational group.
Policy on insuring the fire service will vary between insurance types and will depend on the size of the fire service and the location. Occupational risk for Income Protection is usually unacceptable for example. Life risk may be more acceptable to us but London will be the worst risk at present and most likely to be declined.
At present, terrorism exclusion is not typically included in the terms offered. For Life, we may limit the maximum payout to the company from a single catastrophic event but this limit can be as high as £100m. Any policy that is currently with us that does not specifically exclude terrorism, will pay out in this event (subject to any event limit).
This is current policy, which is regularly reviewed.
ABI
Answers were of a general nature because of the variety of policies available in the UK.
In circumstances such as the recent London bombings the ABI are of the opinion that all insurers would aim to act quickly and sensitively.
11 August 2005
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