by Jamie K. Fleischner, CLU, ChFC, LUTCF
President, Set for Life Insurance
Today I had a CRNA contact me who was in a very typical situation. Her name is “Jan.” Jan just turned 50 and has a disability insurance policy through the CRNA, Certified Registered Nurse Association, AANA. She has $4000/month benefit and her premiums just increased substantially when she reached her 50th birthday.
Jan’s concern was not only did her existing premiums increase, but what were they going to do over the next 15 years? Were there any further options?
Jan lives in New York and her premium increased to $2800/year. When I ran a quote comparison, the rates for a new policy were significantly higher, close to $5000/year. Even though the new individual policy was noncancelable, guaranteed renewable and the rates were fixed to age 65, making a change didn’t seem to make financial sense.
After we talked further, we discovered that Jan worked at a hospital that is affiliated with one of the Set for Life Insurance discounts. This changed her scenario completely. Going to a unisex rate reduced her premiums by 55%. Now, her premium would be $2300/year and this premium is guaranteed to age 65! Not only will she save more immediately, she will save even more in the next 15 years of her career since the rates are guaranteed.
Fortunately Jan is still in good health since she will need to go through the underwriting process. We made sure her new policy had an own occupation definition of disability so it would cover her if she couldn’t work as a nurse anesthetist even if she was able to work in another occupation.
Jan was thrilled and as a testimonial, she passed on the information to her colleagues.
