Life Insurance & mental illness

Yenwod

Hi All - myself & the OH are in the process of purchasing a house and so are taking out life insurance. There is an all encompassing question of:

"Have you ever suffered from or received treatment, advice, or had investigation for any of the following: any mental illness including anxiety, depression, stress, or eating disorder, or have you attempted to harm yourself"

Now aside from the fact that getting "advice on stress" is very different from "treatment from self-harm" - how likely is answering this in the positive is going to cause them to load the policy? I have read up a lot on it and peoples experiences have been wildly different but some of the articles are from yrs ago so I was wondering has anybody had recent experience or knowledge on this?

My own experience is treated mild depression from 10yrs ago, that was triggered by a point in time/situation. I obvioulsy don't want to lie on the form but I want to be prepared for a potentially negative outcome.

phormium

When there is any doubt always answer yes, give details and up to them they to send out a form to your doc to fill and that then covers it off. If it was a thing of nothing then unlikely they would load, however if you forget or miss out anything then you risk invalidating any future claim.

Jim2007

Yenwod wrote: »

how likely is answering this in the positive is going to cause them to load the policy?

No one can tell you that. You don't have a choice, if you want to be covered you must answer the question truthfully. You can expect that your answer will prompt more specific questions which will enable the underwriters to decide on the costs.

I would have thought that mild case of depression, which you have under control should not attract much of a loading. Lots of people suffer from depression, but it is not seen as a major reason for people missing work resulting loss of income etc... But then again all we can do is guess, until you actually hear from the underwriters.

What I find foolish, is people who lie on insurance applications to avoid policy loading and then get all up set when the insurance company refuses to pay out because the breached their contract. And this is particularly so when there are serious amounts of money involved, where it well worth the insurance company's time to have their loss adjusters dig into it.

TheChizler

I put down treatment for anxiety and they sent a form to my GP to fill out. The advisor on the phone who organised the form had the attitude that it was very common and most people don't put it down (wink wink) but because it was now official they had to go through the formal process. GP had the same attitude. There was no loading on the policy.

Rachiee

Mod edit.

TheChizler

Rachiee wrote: »

mod edit

What do you base that on?

Yenwod

Thanks for the responses and yes, I would feel very uncomfotable lying about it and don't want to. Have just been reading such conflicting stuff about it so just seeing if anyone else had been through the process.

One appeal I read about, very logically said that why should someone who sought help and recieved treatment be penalised, while someone else who has not looked for help and so has untreated depression not be penalised. Obviously the underwriter can only base what's in front of them but the latter person is potentially a far higher risk. Just thought that was interesting.

Jim2007

Yenwod wrote: »

One appeal I read about, very logically said that why should someone who sought help and recieved treatment be penalised, while someone else who has not looked for help and so has untreated depression not be penalised. Obviously the underwriter can only base what's in front of them but the latter person is potentially a far higher risk. Just thought that was interesting.

That is not necessarily the case. The definition of a preexisting condition does not require you have had or sought treatment. Say for instance you had bowel cancer and did not seek advice until after you signed the policy, you would still have had the symptoms etc at the time of signing the policy and so you should have known that something was wrong....


At that point it would be up to the courts to decide if you hat been truthful in completing the insurance application or not.

Jim2007

TheChizler wrote: »

I put down treatment for anxiety and they sent a form to my GP to fill out. The advisor on the phone who organised the form had the attitude that it was very common and most people don't put it down (wink wink) but because it was now official they had to go through the formal process. GP had the same attitude. There was no loading on the policy.

Yes, but given the figures involved it is better to have it on record even if you have to pay a little extra.


A mortgage insurance policy is going to kick in at the worst time in life, when one of the parties to the mortgage dies. Being told you still owe a large block of money on top of everything is not something you want to here at that stage.

TheChizler

Jim2007 wrote: »

Yes, but given the figures involved it is better to have it on record even if you have to pay a little extra.

Agree 100% put it down.