These contracts of insurance are called policies and are provided by insurance companies. The Insurance companies charge a regular amount from the customers, which is paid back, either in part, or entirety, to the customers in case of a definite loss. This regular amount charged from customers is called Insurance Premium.

REASONS OF INSURANCE:

Sometimes in life it is not possible to avoid the losses. For example People may become ill. They may die of illness or accidents or their homes or other property may undergo damage or theft. So in all these cases and they have to face the loss of income or savings. So insurance is a manner of financially insuring that if such an incident comes about then the loss does not affect the present well being of the person.

DOCTRINES OF INSURANCE:

1 There should be a certain definite loss taken place at a known time, in a known place and from a known cause. Therefore the time, place and the cause of loss should be clear enough.

2 The incident that represent the cause of the claim should be accidental or beyond the control of the beneficiary.

3 The size of the loss must be significant from the perspective of the insured. Insurance premiums should cover both the estimated cost of losses, plus the cost of policy, regulating the losses, and providing the principal required to logically assure that the insurer would be able to reimburse claims.

4 The amount of premium should be affordable.

5 The possibility of loss and the cost of compensation should be calculable or estimable

TYPES OF INSURANCE:

Below are some kinds of insurances.

LIFE INSURANCE:

Life insurance policy insures the life of the insured. The insurance company is legally bound to provide a monetary benefit to a decedent’s family or the beneficiary after the death of the policyholder. The proceeds are paid to the beneficiary either in a lump sum amount or an annuity

MEDICAL INSURANCE:

Medical insurance is also called medclaim. Under this policy the insurance policy pays the amount to the insured for his health purpose. This amount covers the cost of medical treatment.

DISABILITY INSURANCE:

There are two types of disability insurance.One is simple disability insurance and the other is total disability insurance. In case of simple disability insurance,a financial support on monthly basis is provided by the insurer to the policy holder if he is unable to work due to an injury or an illness. But permanent disability insurance provides the reimbursement if a person becomes permanently disabled.

GENERAL INSURANCE:

It includes automobiles insurance, business insurance, property insurance etc.

Automobile insurance:

In UK this insurance is called motor insurance. It compensates the loss or damage occurred to the vehicle. But in United States auto insurance policy is essential to legally operate a vehicle on public roads.

Business insurance:

Business insurance protects the businesses against risks of losses and damages and compensates in case of loss

Property insurance:

This type of insurance protects the property against the risks like fire, theft etc. This category also includes fire insurance, flood insurance, earthquake insurance etc

Fire Insurance:

It is an insurance covering the damage to the property caused by fire.

Flood Insurance:

This type of insurance pays the policy holder in case of any loss or damage to the property due to flood. It protects the property against the flooding.

Earthquake Insurance:

This insurance compensates any damage to the property caused by earthquake.

IMPORTANCE OF INSURANCE:

Insurance plays an important role in sharing the risks of people in an affordable form.It helps the people to quickly recover from damages and losses.

There are many types of business insurance and an entrepreneur must take advantage of it as long as he is on his own business. There are ample reasons too on why business insurance is an important tool on keeping your business alive and well protected. Often it is your own state government that determines insurance requirements for businesses. This is the reason why you must be aware on the requirement required by your own state. Most of the time owners of business are made to for workers’ compensation insurance, unemployment insurance, and state disability insurance. In other cases, they will also tell you insure specific business activities done by your business. Example of this is when you have a car that you use for the delivery of your goods- that too needs to be insured. Furthermore, if you have lenders and investors, there are added requirements that you must have like business interruption, fire, flood and other protective insurance policies.

There are generally five types of business insurance. They are grouped according to their own features and coverage. The first one is the General Liability Insurance. In this type of business insurance, business owners are covered with the privilege of avoiding legal hassles due to accident, injuries and claims of negligence. It also covers conditions like property damage, medical expenses, and settlement bonds. Aside from that, the business payments can be protected from issues like slander and libel.

The second type is the Product Liability Insurance. This is great for businesses that are into manufacturing, wholesaling and distributing. It would protect the business due to factory defect or bodily harm.

The third type on the other hand is the Professional Liability Insurance. This is ideal for businesses that offer services rather than goods. The coverage in this insurance protects the business against errors, malpractice and negligence in the provision of services to the customers.

Commercial Property Insurance is the fourth type of business insurance. This covers practically everything that the business may experience due to conditions like fire, smoke, wind and hail storms. Civil disobedience and vandalism are also covered in this policy.

A Home-Based Business Insurance is the last type. Homeowners’ insurance policies do not only cover home-based business losses as what others often believe. You can actually add riders to the insurance to accommodate coverage on property loss too.

When choosing the best business insurance, do not forget to evaluate your business first so that you can get the points that may align the needs of your business. Share the idea to your business partners too so you can also decide on the appropriate insurance to protect your business.

Today, numerous insurance companies and agencies exist. Such companies offer different schemes and quotes for different kinds of motorcycles. Due to the large number of companies, you have to be on guard and seek insurance quotes from different companies before you buy a policy.

Insurance quotes can be obtained in different ways. They can be had either from insurance agents or online, by completing a form which requires you to provide certain information.

Quotes provided by insurance companies, agencies, or brokers usually give an estimate of your insurance payment. Insurance quotes are provided quickly online. Online quotes usually offer quotes on a six-month insurance policy.

Companies such as GEICO, Progressive Direct, Insurance Finder, Ace Insurance Services, All State, Sentry Insurance, Motorcycle Services, LLC, Bike-Line, Foremost Insurance Group, and Rider Insurance Agency provide free online insurance quotes to motorcyclists.

Insurance quotes usually vary from one company to the other, depending upon a number of factors including the type of coverage (liability, medical payment, roadside help, uninsured motorcyclist, and much more), motorcycle engine, type of motorcycle, brand of motorcycle, your driving history, your locality, driving education, and many other factors.

Hence, a bad driving history, sports bikes, less secure locality, and other factors lower your chances of getting a discounted insurance policy.

Quotes are the first step towards buying motorcycle insurance. Providing an idea of insurance offered by different companies, they help you choose the best motorcycle insurance policy.

For the citizens of Georgia, a wide variety of health insurance plans are available to choose from. Each one varies significantly based on the size of deductible and the benefits covered. Individual health insurance, family health insurance, group health insurance, student health insurance, affordable health insurance, health insurance for children only, and temporary health insurance are some of the insurance plans available in Georgia.

In Georgia, health insurance laws and regulations regarding individual health insurance is different from other US states. The law allows insurers to deny the request for individual health insurance based on pre-existing medical condition and current health conditions.

The state of Georgia has moderate insurance regulation which protects both insurance consumers as well as the insurance company. According to “guaranteed renewability provision”, a health insurance policy regulation, an insurance owner is allowed to renew a policy without considering his/her health status.

In Georgia there is no limit on the premiums that the companies can charge for a health plan. Also, the law restricts that an insurer cannot cancel one?s insurance policy based on their health condition or age. In certain states, children of unemployed parents are denied from getting health insurance policy. Through a plan called Peach Care, Georgia State provides opportunity for such children to be insured.

Before purchasing health insurance, it is necessary to compare the different health insurance quotes. An insurance agent or an insurance broker is the right person to help you in finding a health insurance policy that best suits your requirement. Blue Cross Blue Shield of Georgia, Kaiser Permanente, Assurant Health, Celtic Insurance Company, Time Insurance Company, and United Healthcare of Georgia are some of the leading companies that provide excellent health insurance coverage for the citizens of Georgia.

One of the biggest gripes about the insurance industry has been that users have been purchasing insurance almost blindfolded, completely at the mercy of the agent who unabashedly pushes products where he earns the maximum commission. The costs of distribution in insurance are massive, and there are significant inefficiencies within the system. As with any other channel where commissions are unrealistically high, there are many layers and sub layers of distribution, the ultimate cost of which is borne by the consumer. This is where the internet can step in, getting the buyer and the insurance company much closer, and thus ultimately leading to lower purchase price.

In India, the recent trend has been that people have started using the internet extensively to compare insurance online before buying. Insurance purchase through the internet is still in its infancy, but it is a matter of time before things catch up. With broadband penetration set to surge beyond the current levels of 10 mn connections, the use of the internet can only increase. The efficiency that the internet has brought in is primarily in terms of allowing the user to compare all features of the insurance company including price through the individual websites of the companies or through aggregator sites. In that sense, there is a tremendous responsibility on aggregator sites to provide unbiased information. Whether that is happening or not is a different matter altogether. The level of mis-selling that is there in insurance is of epic proportions. Regular premium policies have been sold as recurring bank deposits, non guaranteed products have been sold as guaranteed products, direct debit mandates have been taken from unsuspecting consumers…even if the internet can reduce the level of mis-selling a bit, it would have more than served its purpose. The important factor to note in any price comparison of insurance policies is that the savings through lower premium is not only for a year, but this benefit is passed on every year on renewal. A health insurance policy bought at a 40% lower price than a policy of another company is likely to cost 40% less on each subsequent renewal. The power of accumulated savings is thus huge, as we can see.

At the same time, there is one disturbing trend that is being seen in aggregator sites. We are seeing that products which frankly do not merit comparisons are being compared. A case in point is pensions product, where the variable with perhaps more than 90% weightage is fund performance of the company. Yet we still find aggregator sites providing comparisons using the assumed rate of return of 6% and 10 %. A.25% lower fund management fee of one company is irrelevant if it underperforms the fund performance of another company cumulatively by even 1% Insurance products that lend itself the best to a comparison are health insurance, car insurance and term life insurance. This is primarily because there is a direct price comparison, and there are direct feature comparisons. Additional features can be attributed a monetary value, and the user can then do an analysis whether the overall price equation makes sense. Products like child policies, pensions, or for those matter investment products are very difficult to compare on the price front, and more often than not the comparisons are meaningless.

Fraudulent insurance claims total 1.9 billion pounds a year and adds an average of 44 pounds to the annual cost paid by policyholders.

An added expense, insurers don’t think that customers should be paying for and are making fraud investigation a priority.

Here are a couple of examples of the type of insurance scams that are making the headlines.

Crash for Cash Traffic Accidents

Reported recently was an event that occurred in Manchester, England concerning a crash for cash insurance fraud.

The offender would be paid a fee by a car owner to knowingly cause his vehicle to be involved in an accident, with the premise that they could claim the third party’s insurance company for compensation, court costs and courtesy cars.

It is important to know that if you start a fraud investigation against someone who claims that they were involved in an accident, you must have a quality plan and photographic evidence of the accident as these will needed to be produced in court.

For this you need to supply a map of the location and a concise statement of the facts and what you will get in return is a detailed report and photographs clearly showing the scene and a sketch giving measurements of the roads, plus statements from witnesses and police.

In the case of acquiring evidence, it is important that you get all the details so that the lawyer has access to the best available evidence.

Payment Protection Insurance Fraud

This is committed by people taking PPI to cover loans, credit cards and other monetary agreements.

Basically anything that they can take out a large sum of money on and then use the insurance to pay it back.

The main ways of claiming on insurance policies are feigned illness and claimed unemployment.

It will not be the first time that someone has claimed to have suffered a debilitating injury that prevents them from working and paying off their credit legitimately, only to have a fraud investigation surveillance team capture video of them doing somersaults on the trampoline in the back garden.

These allegations can be investigated to help determine the truth by hiring fraud investigation operatives to collect and collate evidence in the form of video, photos and detailed written reports.

Surveillance should preferably be carried out by a male and female team members, who will physically follow an individual from a designated location and then take video and still images without the subject being aware. As an alternative the installation of covert day and night CCTV cameras may be a more suitable option.

A good way to arrive at a selling price is negotiation. The important fact is that the settlement amount has to be reasonable for both parties. It is a little like finding the middle ground for both the insured and policy buyer.

If you are getting this insurance settlement as a personal injury settlement, then you should consider all your expenses before agreeing to a price. The expenses to consider could include medical expenses, financial losses due to injury, and emotional trauma. Also, do not forget to calculate any longer term effects that may be caused by the injury.

The law required that all insurance companies reimburse all claims in a prompt and reasonable amount of time. However, this “prompt and reasonable time” may differ from claim to claim and insurance company to insurance company. There may be certain claims that necessitate special or extended investigation may take longer to resolve.

It would be prudent to take advice from an attorney prior to making any kind of commitment in an insurance settlement, whether it is a life insurance policy, health insurance policy, or any other insurance policy. An attorney can aid you in addressing the right questions and can give you a chance to get a fair settlement and can help with court proceedings if need be.

The amount of coverage you are offered depends on your contract with the insurance company. What your dental insurance company pays depends on many factors including deductibles, maximum allowable benefits, substitution clauses, and exclusion clauses.

Orthodontic dental insurance will cover a part of your orthodontic treatment expenses. Orthodontics generally deals with the corrective surgeries and treatments required to correct deformities of teeth arrangements. Treatments that involve orthodontics are quite expensive.

Atlanta Dental Group and Pacific Dental Insurance are some of the leading insurance companies that cover orthodontic dental insurances.

Orthodontic dental insurance is intended to cover both routine as well as not-so-routine dental works. Dentistry involving dental implants, root canal treatments, and orthodontic braces can get to be quite expensive.

Orthodontic dental insurance will enable you to take care of all your dental problems as they arise. This also covers oral surgery for recessed gums or the removal of wisdom teeth. If your teeth need to be re-aligned for health reasons, then the cost falls under orthodontic dental insurance.

Some of the plans of orthodontic dental insurance will not cover cosmetic surgery procedures, as they are not health related. But some orthodontic dental insurance plans do cover a part of the expenses.

It is always wise decision to take up orthodontic dental insurance policies as these treatments cost you a lot more than regular dental procedures. These policies will help you save a lot of money. You can show the policies to the physicians and get your treatments done.

Though most of the insurance companies offer orthodontic insurance policies for all ages, there are some companies that will limit treatments to patients up to the ages of 19 or 21.

With dental insurance, all you need to worry about is making your regular trips to the dentist. You can have your teeth taken care of without worrying too much about the cost; your dental insurance will cover it.

Depending on the type of car, insurance companies offer different kinds of policies with varying premium amounts. For instance, there are the regular and classic car insurance policies for regular and classic car models respectively.

Classic car insurance is offered only if the car to be insured is more than fifteen years old and if the car has not been driven for more than 2500 miles every year. It differs from regular car insurance in terms of the coverage offered and the terms of the claims.

Some companies offer a classic car insurance policy with limited mileage. These insurance policies are more affordable as the premiums are lower. The annual mileage is reported and reviewed and if the mileage limit is exceeded, the policy is not renewed. The policy also accommodates full coverage incase of any breakdown or repair. The factors that are assessed while offering classic car insurance with limited mileage are the type of car driven, the use for which it is being driven, area where the driver lives, driving record of the driver, number of drivers to be listed in the policy and the age of the driver.

Incase the driver does not exceed the mileage specified, the premium rates are significantly reduced. If policyholders do not make a claim because of the absence of any damage during the coverage period, they are offered discounts. Companies offering classic car insurance policies ensure rapid repairs, fair settlements and also bear the cost of replacing entry, ignition and steering locks, if the keys are stolen. Thus, under the terms of classic car insurance with limited mileage, an insured can enjoy many benefits but has to stick to the mileage limits prescribed by the insurance company.

It was quite true in India few years back when the insurance industry was not opened to foreign investors and financial reforms have not been implemented. In pre reform era there was only one Life Insurance Company in India – LIC- Life Insurance Corporation of India. It had a monopoly in this industry and the government support and backing.

Being the only player in the market, there was nothing special in the kinds of policies – as a product. Whatever was available, at whatever price and in whatever form- was sold and purchased? It has no alternative and customers were compelled to purchase those products.

In those days particularly long term plans, life term plans – known as term policies or whole life policies were mainly sold by LIC. It had a peculiar term ranging from 20-35 years. The only specialty of LIC plans was that they were available at meager cost, very low monthly installments etc. They were quite within the reach of a common man. So people purchased them not with great intention, but for having some insurance cover or in many cases even not knowing the reason of purchasing. It was just a one aspect of saving some money, without any thinking of return on it.

Naturally as insurance was never thought as an investment avenue, no one expected great returns on it. People were happy with whatever 6 -7% returns they got over the span of 20-35 years. Therefore insurance has never been considered as an investment option in India till recently.

Financial Reforms in India, including insurance reforms opened doors to foreign investors and Indian Market was flooded with number of experienced, developed, world known insurance players from the world.

This reform process has greatly benefited the Indian customers in various ways. Completely new types of plans, tested worldwide were made available to them. The competition in the market improved the customer service of LIC out of business compulsions. Availability of multiple products made them possible to compare the benefits and cost structure, which was unknown for them up till now. Before insurance reforms hardly anyone known the cost involved in LIC policies, and no one bothered about it also.

The main changing factor was the introduction of unit linked policies. These are the new products, wherein people can think of earning more returns, even more than the fixed deposit rates of the nationalized banks in India in medium to long term plans. As unit linked policies offer higher return, naturally it involves greater risk also. However, no one can think of high return without any risk. Those are related to share market and high fluctuations and volatility in it also affects the valuation of the units – called as NAV- net asset value. However experience teaches that in spite of cost and risk involved in it, it offer higher return to the Investor. Investor can look to insurance policy as a way of earning higher return, as an investment avenue. It can be easily included in investment portfolio of common man.

ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Company, the leading and Number One private insurance company, since its inception, has maintained its lead in the industry in India due to its best’s products, efficient service, customer friendly approach, wise investment policy and so many other factors. Insurance policy holders of ICICI Prudential Life Insurance have been rewarded with high and reliable returns. Therefore today in India now even the common man’s idea of looking towards insurance is also changing. It is not only considered as coverage of risk of death but also appreciation of premium paid over the term during life, so that he can enjoy benefit of insurance policy during life. There is no use of it to proposer after his death.

So ICICI Prudential Life Insurance Policies are giving convincing high return for enjoyment during life time – ” Enjoy Wealth created during the Life Time”