Wednesday 31 August 2016

Getting the Best Deal Out of Your Car Insurance

Over the years, auto insurance premiums have slowly by steadily soared from what they use to be. Yet as the premium rates rise, there are always ways to get the best deal from your insurance. The topic on its own cannot be exhausted in a single post. We will just take a look at some tips to lower your premium rates.



Park Your Car in a Safe Place
One of the things you would expect your auto insurance to cover is damages or loss caused by theft or any other related activities.  The idea with lowering premiums is to reduce the risk associated with your car. You can reduce this risk by parking your car(s) in a secured garage or driveway.

Install a Car Alarm
A car alarm on its own does not have the capabilities to prevent theft but it can fend it off. Modern cars come fitted with a car alarm with gets triggered whenever there is an unauthorized entry or an attempted entry. You have to ensure you have a car alarm that is approved by your insurer.

Drive a Less Expensive Car

If you have a thing for cars, this may not go down well with you. For insurers, the less expensive a vehicle is, the less risk it has. This is because it costs more to repair or replace an expensive car than it is to repair or replace a less expensive car.

Tuesday 30 August 2016

Bodily Injury Liability vs Personal Injury Protection

The first time you get insurance, especially auto insurance, you would almost be confused with all the policies thrown your way. It is for this reason that it is advised to seek the assistance of an expert auto insurance agent. Bodily injury liability and personal injury protection offer coverage for medical expenses incurred after an accident. Their major difference is whose medical expenses it covers.



Personal Injury Protection (PIP), just like its name suggests, is a coverage that takes care of you and your passengers. This means when you or other occupants in your car are involved in an accident, irrespective of whether you are at fault or not, the insurer will take responsibility for all medical expenses.


Bodily Injury Liability (BIL) is a direct opposite of the PIP. This policy does not cover you or any occupant of your car. If you are the cause of the accident, this policy looks to cover and protect your interest. It does this by taking care of all the medical expenses needed to get third party occupants treated. By third party, we are referring to anybody involved in the accident apart from you or anyone in your car. 

Monday 29 August 2016

Homeowners Insurance: Flood and Earthquakes

Homeowner’s insurance policy protects your home from all damages and loses. This is usually the leading line some insurance companies would use to sell you their policy. While there is nothing out rightly wrong with this, it is somewhat misleading. It just takes a simple "all" word to not only make the statement invalid but has the tendency of causing problems later in the future for clients and insurers.



The standard homeowner’s insurance policy covers damages and loss to homes but usually excludes flooding and earthquake related damages. This is not the time to question why or why it isn't included. When buying your homeowners insurance policy, do not go with the impression that it is included. For further clarification, you should feel free to ask your insurance agent.


If you live in areas that are prone or susceptible to flooding and earthquakes, it is best to include their coverage in your policy. Like other reasons for buying insurance, you cannot predict when and to what extent the damage from these natural disasters could be. You will always be safe to have it included to your insurance policy.

Sunday 28 August 2016

2 Saving Tips: Car Insurance

For most people, their car(s) will be the second most expensive investment they will make. The last thing anyone would want is to have an accident. If there is one thing driving has taught us, it has to be the fact that accident can occur any day. So no doubt, auto insurance policy is a must-have for everyone.



Evaluate Your Insurance Needs
There are several things to add to your coverage. If you are not careful, you will end up including coverage you don’t necessarily need. The limits for auto insurance vary from one state, country, and insurer. It is best you get a good understanding of what your insurer is offering and only select the types you know is suitable for your car(s).

Keep Your Records Clean

This may not seem like it but your credit card record can affect your rates. Insurers use it to determine how much of a risk a client is. If you have a bad credit card record, don’t be surprised if it is reflected as high rate premium. The same can be said of driving records. If you have a bad driving record, insurers consider you as a high risk client too. For this reason they will rate you in the category of high premium.

Friday 26 August 2016

Buying Cyber Insurance: Including BYOD to Your Policy

As important as cyber insurance, it does tend to have some gaps which need to be filled. The best way to fill these gaps is having proper understanding of the policy. When we talk about cyber-attacks, too often we focus our attention to business and business related devices and technologies. if we should take things as they truly occur in reality, we all would agree that employees often use their personal devices for work related activities.



As a matter of fact, some businesses even make this acceptable as they encourage it to boost productivity. Just like any device in your business is vulnerable to data breach, the same applies to those personal devices of your employees. The truth is that your standard cyber insurance policy does not include these employees’ devices to its coverage.


BYOD generally stands for ‘Bring Your Own Device” and covers all devices that are not registered to the business. So when reading through your policy, you should make it clear to the insurer that the term ‘computer system’ is not just limited to your business owned computer systems. Without the BYOD included in the policy, it means if the data breach occurs through your employee’s personal devices, the insurer would not take responsibility for such damage or loss.

Thursday 25 August 2016

Tips on Getting Fast Life Insurance Underwriting

Not many people realize that it takes almost 2 month for insurers to gather information before making an offer. Sometimes it may seem like it is taking forever and can be frustrating. If you want to get ahead of these delays, here are few tips to get a quick underwriting.



Provide All Your Physician Information
Life insurance companies would need to contact all your physicians. This is done to properly and accurately determine the level and condition of your health. By providing the necessary contact information, these insurance companies would not have to bother searching for it. According to a top life insurance agent at Greater National Group, the underwriting process seems to take forever because necessary information are not adequately provided by clients.

Medical Examination
This is yet another step that could delay the application process entirely. Most people tend to wait out first before scheduling a medical examination. The insurer would need to get your health status details and would not proceed without it. To give you a better lead, try scheduling your medical examination a week before you apply for the policy. This will give ample time for your physician to fit you in for an examination.

Work with the Insurer
This may seem like a well-known fact but you will be surprised to know that most people actually don't practice it. Establishing a good working cooperation with the insurer will ensure the underwriting process moves a whole lot faster.

Wednesday 24 August 2016

A Common Gap in Disability Insurance Policy

If you take a close look at what disability insurance stands for, it is clear to see that it is an amazing policy for employees. Not only does it protect the business and business owners, it also helps bears the risk of the employees. As benevolent as this policy may seem, there are also some gaps that arise in the policy. If not properly understood, these gaps could cause a devastating effect on the employee.



Disabilityinsurance pays a part of the salary of employees to them if they are involved in work related injuries. This means as long as they are away from work, they still get to receive a portion of the salary. What most people don’t realize is the fact that a part of your salary may not really be significant to cater for your needs. The policy could pay as high as 60% of your salary but this would only be meaningful if your salary is large.

The policy also doesn’t include bonuses and commissions. So if you get more in commissions and bonuses, you should not expect the policy to pay your any part from. To give a better illustration, let’s imagine you receive an annual salary of $10,000 and commissions of $50,000. The disability insurance is able to pay as high as 60% of your $10,000 but never the $50,000. So if you have expenses calculated with both the $10,000 and $50,000, the 60% would not be enough. To fill this gap, it is advised to take up additional disability coverage; just in case.

Tuesday 23 August 2016

Comparing Premium Prices of Business Insurance

In today's world, every business needs to have a certain amount of insurance coverage. This is not only mandatory, it is important to the business. When it comes to your business, you always have several pool of options to work with. Getting started with insurance would often begin by choosing a professional and reliable insurer. One of the key factors to differentiate one insurer from the other is the price offered for the policies.




For this reason, getting to do a detailed research is paramount. To help make it easier to compare, it's advisable that you start off by making a list of insurers you're considering. While policies are basically the same, they are usually offered at different prices and packages. With your detailed research, you should be able to get the prices and package offered.

You should not rely solely on the company's ads as they tend to often be over exaggerated. The best way to know would be from asking a client or customer that's using the services. Look out for promos and discounts and ensure you use them to your advantage. You should always have a defined budget that puts a price on the amount your business can afford to pay. 

Monday 22 August 2016

Hiring a Public Adjuster

If you have no idea who a public adjuster is, then you either do not have insurance or you have never filed a claim. While not many people make use of a public adjuster, they function the same way as the adjuster giving to you by your insurance company. The major difference between a public adjuster and a company adjuster is who they are working for. When you report a damage or loss to your insurance company, the company almost immediately sends an adjuster to verify your claims. The adjuster works to make sure the company gets the best deal from the filed claim and also leaves you happy and comfortable.




A public adjuster on the other hand works entirely in your favor. They ensure you get paid for all the damages and loss as provided by the policy. In other words, a public adjuster can be ruthless in ensuring you get you desired compensation. Most people do not opt for the option of a public adjuster because most insurance companies know how well to broker a deal. If and when you are having issues with your insurer regarding compensation, you can always trust a public adjuster to help you fight for it. The adjuster’s work will only be completed if and when he secures your payment.

Friday 19 August 2016

Getting the Best out of Your Homeowner’s Policy

When buying insurance policies, we often look at it from one direction – your benefits and your advantages. Well there is absolutely nothing wrong with this as it helps us ensure we get the best of policies. What if there is another way to view it to get the best deal?



You see, insurance companies are not some charity organization and it is best to understand what drives them and how they operate. Obviously one is not expecting you to go and learn the trades of insurance but the simple basics should be enough. While insurance companies take on the risks associated with your damage or loss, it is best to understand the level they can bear and why they can only bear that much.

A homeowner’s policy is designed to protect your home. If you have lots of valuables in the house, you may find the premium a bit too high. In trying to reduce people end up reducing the quality and coverage of the policy. Try installing a fire and security alarm and even go as far as linking it to your local police station. Cut down trees and shrubs that can cause damage to your property. Basically, do your best to protect your home as if you are not buying the insurance. These will not only help to reduce the premiums, it would also help keep your home extra safe for you – this way you even increase your deductible.

Wednesday 17 August 2016

Steps to Filing a Cyber Insurance Claim

We all get cyber insurance to protect and cover us in case of a cyber attack. In the real sense, no business will want its data to be breached. Like most things in life, data breach is unpredictable and slowly becoming inevitable. So in case you are a victim of a data breach and you already have a cyber insurance policy, these are the steps you should follow in filing your claim. It’s important to note that different companies have slight variations in these steps. It’s best to work closely with your insurance company to see their exact steps.



Call Your Insurance Company
Irrespective of the type or location of the insurance company, this is usually the first step when filing  a claim. This steps notifies the insurance company of the loss or damage of your data. It is important that you put a call across to them immediately you experience or notice the loss or damage. Usually the company will acknowledge it and get back to you shortly.

Make a List
This part can be done before, during, or after making the call. If it is done before the call, then it has to be done quickly. Take a detailed inventory of all the affected data loss or damage. Not only will it allow you file a proper claim; it would help you accurately remember what exactly was lost or damaged.

Work with the Company

The insurance company will send in an adjuster and a usually a cyber security expert. While they are trying to ascertain the level of loss or damage, they would also be working to prevent further loss or damage. Make available to them all information that can help speed up either process. The sooner this step is done, the quicker your filed claim will be responded to.

Monday 15 August 2016

2 Tips to Prepare Your Business for Data Breach

If you are reading this, chances are you are aware of the dangers of data breaches or hacks to any business - big or small businesses. While the world governments and the tech world put their heads together to provide solutions, as a business owner, you also need to take proactive steps. It goes without saying that you should have bought the right cyber insurance policy for your business by now. Even with this in place, you shouldn't sit back and leave your business security to chance. Here are two tips you should practice.



Develop a Formidable Incident Response Plan

This is not the time for any business to be living in denial. Cyber-attacks are real and can happen to just about anyone. Having an incident response plan on ground will help your business stand strong even after a data breach. In developing an incident response plan, you should ask yourself certain questions.

The answer to these questions will help you create your response plan. These questions include but not limited to, do you have a central command center in place? Who and what are the decision makers and investigative tools available? Who will take care of your PR? What exactly will you communicate?

Test Your Security System

This may seem like a normal thing to do but there are lots of businesses who really never do this. The basic idea behind this is to eradicate complacency. This will allow you find loopholes in your security systems before the hackers do. It is commonplace these days to see businesses hiring ethical hackers to help test their security systems occasionally. This may seem a bit expensive for growing small businesses but you could have an I.T expert help out with this. You will be amazed how this alone can help fortify your security systems, if done regularly and properly.

Friday 12 August 2016

You vs Your Insurer vs Uninsured Driver

The sole purpose of purchasing an auto insurance policy is to get protection from damages or losses during a car accident. Most people are yet to see the full benefits of this policy until they are involved in an accident. Car accident occurs every day and can happen to anyone. For this reason, there is no way to totally avoid it; unless you are the only driver on the road.



Usually we are well equipped on the steps to take when you are involved in an accident. Have you ever thought of what you would do if you discover the other driver doesn’t have any insurance policy? Exchanging insurance information is usually one of the foremost steps to take and dealing with an uninsured driver makes this a whole lot difficult. So we decided to ask a professional auto insurance agent to briefly explain how to go about this and what would happen in such a situation.

If the cause of the accident you sustain injuries, your insurer will take full responsibility for your medical expenses. If you have no injury but your car is damaged, then you would only be able to lay claim payments if you have collision insurance. This is usually a type of insurance policy under auto insurance you have the option of including to your policy package. If you have this coverage or anything similar to it, then irrespective of whether the other driver is insured or not, your insurer pays for the damages.

Tuesday 9 August 2016

Cyber Insurance: Preventing a Data Breach

With each passing year, businesses are becoming more vulnerable to data breaches than ever before. This raises the risk of identity theft and fraud to a whole new level. While cyber insurance has been able to cushion the effect of data breaches on companies with such policies, there are still proactive steps businesses can take to prevent such breaches.  



Store Only Needed Information

Businesses can have a large volume of information, depending on the size of the business. One way to prevent data breaches is to limit available information. Only keep information that you need at a time in places that are susceptible to hacks. Dumping all of your information in one place makes hackers interested and increases the damage impact.

Destroy Before Disposing

Any material or item relating to your business should be destroyed. It may seem like rubbish fit for garbage but you have no idea who needs it. For this reason, always destroy CDs or any media drive before disposing them.

Physically Secure Your Business

While cyber-attacks are online driven, you would be surprised that some of these hacks occur because they were able to get access to your business physically. Areas where you store important information should be safeguarded properly. Limit the number of staff with access to such areas. This will help pinpoint any intruder or accomplice.

Train Your Employees

The war against cyber threat is a worldwide battle and there's need for you to actively participate. One way is to keep your employees trained and updated on the level of cyber security available. It takes a simple negligence from one of your employees for such hacks to occur. Train them on how to avoid falling prey to them.

Monday 8 August 2016

General Business Liability Insurance: Filing a Claim

One of the benefits of having an insurance policy is to get coverage in case of damages or loss to you, your business, employees, and third parties. The first step to getting this coverage when you need it is filing a claim. The same applies when you have s general business liability insurance. Just to clarify, general business liability insurance protects your business from litigation from third parties for damages or losses caused by you or your employees. In filing a claim in this policy, you would need to follow these steps.



Contact Your Insurer

Immediately the damage or loss occurs, you should put a call across to your insurer. It is very important that they are notified as quickly as possible. Since the insurer will be responsible for all payments, they would need to get as much information as possible.

Take Pictures Where Necessary

Luckily, we live in an era of technological advancement and smart phones are readily available. Take pictures and video of the incident. This will help the insurer get a true picture of what really happened. All of it will be used as evidence if and when there is need for it.

Use Eyewitness to Your Advantage

Usually when accidents occur, there are eyewitnesses. An eligible eyewitness is one that has no ties to you or your business. If there are eyewitnesses, try and get their contact information and ask if they will be ok if you contacted them to act as witness.

Friday 5 August 2016

Additional Tips to Buying Auto Insurance Policy

Since you have decided to buy an auto insurance policy, it is best you get it right without having to live with regrets. Here are some other tips you should also take to heart as you shop around for a good auto insurance policy.



Look at Your Driving Record
Your driving record plays a very important role in determining your premium. If you have not have any bad record in the past, you may not need to worry much about this. Things like speeding tickets are enough to affect your policy. If you have bad points on your record that may soon disappear, it is best you wait it out before buying your auto insurance policy.

Gather Information about the Company
When looking to gather information, the two aspects you should focus your attention on are coverage and price. You should know the monthly and annual rates for the available policies. Next thing should be the payment policy of the companies. Usually different companies offer different payment plans. You shouldn’t assume one payment plan is the same for all. You should also avail yourself with the telephone numbers of the companies.

Call the Companies
Although internet based research is commendable, you still won’t be able to get all of the information for each company. With the telephones number you have gathered, contact each and every one of the companies to ask them more personal questions. If you are not ok with the information received, you can schedule a face-to-face appointment with a professional in the company.

Wednesday 3 August 2016

3 Professional Tips for Buying Any Insurance Policy

Buying insurance is one of the smartest financial decisions anyone can make. This is because we live in a world plagued with many uncertainties. It's good to have an insurer that's willing to assist in part or full in times of a loss or damage. Since we cannot dispute the advantages of insurance, we decided to ask insurance professionals for their top 3 tips to anyone looking to buy insurance. Here are the top tips they came up with:



Determine How Much Coverage You Really Need

Before you go about buying any insurance policy, you should have a defined level of coverage you want. There are general insurance policies which will provide the basics for that type of insurance. If you would need specific additions to this general coverage, you would have to pay more in premium. If you do not have a defined coverage you hope to have, you'll easily get confused into buying some policies you don't even need.

Conduct an Extensive Research

We live in an age where information is just right at the tips of your finger. Don't take everything at face value and make decisions with it. Go online and research every new detail you find. If you're uncertain or don't understand any aspect of the insurance, do not proceed any further until all is clear and understood. Many people tend to rush into getting insurance, only to discover when it's too late that they didn't get exactly what they needed.

Know More about the Company

When looking to get insurance, more often than not, you will have several insurers to choose from. Among those you have selected, you should put them through proper analysis of their reputation, experience level, and customer satisfaction. Having a good reputation would speak well of the company's track record and popularity. Experience level should deal with how many insurance they have sold and for how long. Customer satisfaction is the final piece of the puzzle. Even with the best reputation and experience, a good insurance company should have customers that are truly satisfied with the services they render.