Blog - Insurance Agency Singapore | Commercial Insurance and Personal Insurance

Here’s how to get the Best Deal out of Your Car Insurance Policy

15 May 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Car insurance is now mandatory for every vehicle on the road in pretty much every country. The benefit of having a car insurance is in case of an accident, you do not have to worry about the payment for damages done to properties or people as the insurance will cover them.

Obviously like every insurance, car insurance also comes with different terms and conditions. There are many factors that affect the cost of your insurance coverage. So, it’s better to disclose all the facts to the insurer.

As you know car insurance policies are not cheap. So to help you out in saving some cash while getting a car insurance, today we are here with a few tips to help you save while picking a car insurance.

But Why Is Car Insurance Expensive?

Before we get you through the tips that can save you some extra money while choosing a car insurance, you most probably would be asking yourself why is car insurance expensive after all?

Well, there are a variety of factors affecting the premium of car insurance.

For starters, there is the need to pay for either your own car or other’s car or property in case of an accident. Depending upon the intensity of the accident, insurance companies will have to shed quite a large amount of money to compensate for your accident.

Then there is the case wherein insurance companies have to pay for any repairs that are required for your car. This is the most frequent insurance claim scenario and most of the car owners claim insurance for any repair work needed for their car. And depending on the car model and value, spare parts and repair work will also cost quite a large sum.

by Arpita Arya

See Full Story at goodmenproject.com

Do College Students Need Renters Insurance?

10 May 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

When you’re packing for college, you may be thinking more about clothes, gaming consoles or the perfect laptop than insurance. Whether you’re heading to a campus dorm, renting a house or leasing an off-campus apartment, it’s important to protect your possessions.

Don’t make the mistake of thinking you’re too poor to need coverage. Many students have personal items – such as electronics, furniture, sporting equipment and clothes – worth thousands of dollars. Plus, college parties are prime opportunities for trouble, including injuries to a guest or property damage to your place.

What renters insurance covers. A common misconception about renting is that the property owner is obligated to reimburse you in the event of a catastrophe, such as a theft, fire or storm. As empathetic as your landlord may be, his or her insurance never covers you.

In other words, it’s your problem if something valuable is stolen from your rental, or you return to discover your possessions destroyed by a fire. It’s not a pretty picture – or an affordable one – especially for a college student.

Fortunately, renters insurance is a bargain for the protections you get in a basic policy:

Personal property. Protects the value of your belongings from a covered event anywhere in the world, such as damage from a natural disaster, loss or theft. Common exceptions include flooding and earthquakes.
Liability. Protects you against a claim or lawsuit if you accidentally hurt someone, or a visitor is injured in your rental.
Additional living expenses. Pays for temporary housing and meals if you can’t live in your rental while covered damages are repaired.

By Laura Adams

See Full Story at money.usnews.com

5 Things to Know About Your Life Insurance

8 May 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

When it comes to strengthening your overall financial wellness, many people could benefit from flexing their muscles with a greater understanding of life insurance.

Think about going to a gym and walking into a room with a variety of machines and equipment. What if you don’t know what they do or how to properly use them? This is similar to how many Americans feel about the various forms of life insurance. People know they need it, but they are often unsure of the type of coverage they should get and when to get it.

To help you get started, here are five important questions you should ask yourself.

Why do I need life insurance? Many people simply overlook the important role that life insurance plays in financial planning. It’s not typically as popular of a topic as portfolio construction or retirement income planning. The reality, however, is that as we transition into adulthood and take on growing responsibilities and family obligations, life insurance soon becomes fundamental to having a comprehensive plan.

Thinking about the unexpected isn’t always easy, but taking the necessary precautions has it benefits. Just like a healthy body, protecting your assets in your financial plan with life insurance can help mitigate future risk. For example, if you have outstanding debts or financial obligations, the right policy may help ensure that those burdens do not fall on your family members after you’re gone.

Beyond the most common use, which is providing a death benefit, life insurance may also come in handy for more sophisticated planning. If you have a child with special needs or a life-altering condition, death benefits may provide the ability to secure their financial future without adversely impacting your other children. Or, it could provide the means to cover any taxes that might be left on your estate.

At the end of the day, you want to know that your loved ones will be taken care of, and life insurance can help to deliver that sense of comfort.

By Tom Halloran

See Full Story at money.usnews.com

How to Choose the Best Insurance for Your Business

3 May 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Incorporating your business or forming a limited liability corporation is the first step in protecting your business and personal assets if something happens inside your business.

However, securing the right types of insurance is the next step you need to take to protect yourself and your firm. Here are a few tips on how to choose the right insurance for your business.

What are the General Types of Insurance?

Before you start shopping for insurance, you have to know the major types available. They can usually be divided into four main categories.

Business property insurance gives you protection in the event that business property (buildings, personal property, land, etc.) has suffered some sort of damage or has been destroyed. Business property insurance will usually be the one protecting you if you incur any loss in a fire or flood, for instance.

Business liability insurance will usually be what will protect you in the event someone happens to hurt themselves on your premises. Product liability insurance, on the other hand, will give you coverage in the event someone happens to suffer damages due to one of your products. When you’ll start looking for liability insurance, it would be wise to ask some business owners you know which type of coverage they have. Policies may have similar names, but they may not give you the same protection.

Business auto insurance is in many ways identical to your regular auto insurance, with the exception that it covers you when the car in question is being used for business. This is usually what will cover you if you or one of your employees is involved in an accident with one of the company’s cars. And if you take comprehensive coverage, you will usually be covered for things like theft or fire.

Business umbrella insurance will be used when you have claims that exceed the limit your other insurance can’t provide cover. Business umbrella insurance will act as an extra layer of protection and cover for any extra damage expenses. Umbrella insurance also often provides protection for events other insurance types don’t cover.

See Full Story at www.finsmes.com

How To Save Money On Your Insurance Premiums

26 April 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

After what felt like the longest month in history, January is finally over! While you may have been pinching the pennies in the lead up to pay day and living on beans on toast, it’s now the perfect time of the year to get clever with your cash and start saving. You’ll thank us later when you’re sipping a cocktail on the beach.

We’ve teamed up with Blue Insurance to bring you some handy tips to help you get the most of out your insurance premiums whether it’s for your Home, Motor, Gadget or for your Pet.

Home:

Make sure your home is fitted with smoke and burglar alarms to instantly reduce the risk associated with your policy resulting in a lower premium.
Insure your property based on the Reinstatement Value and not the market value of the home.
Consider a 2-year policy. This will save both money and the stress of renewing (and possible price hikes) for a whole two years, even if you make a claim.

Motor

Your occupation can have a huge impact on any quote you’re offered. Insurers are more interested in what it is you do and not your title. If it’s unclear to the insurer what your title means, they could rate you in a higher category.
Have your car valued in advance by a few sources.
Paying your policy in one go can sometimes end up being less expensive.
Consider a 2 year policy.

Travel:

Get private health insurance
Purchase a multi-trip policy
Research the different levels of cover available

Gadget:

Purchase from a dedicated gadget insurance company to get a more competitive price
Only insure for what you feel may actually happen to the device
Bundle multiple gadgets into the same policy

See Full Story at www.98fm.com

A Beginners Guide to Rental Car Insurance

24 April 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Renting a vehicle can be one of the most confusing, frustrating and potentially risky parts of travel, especially when it comes to understanding the insurance cover you may (or may not) be getting. Get things wrong and you could suddenly find your holiday becomes a very expensive one!

If you rent a vehicle in most countries in the world excluding Canada and the United States, you’ll typically find yourself with several options for the excess or excess reduction when you make your booking. In the example below from Apex Car Rental here in New Zealand you’ll see a $2,000 excess is standard – this is known as a collision loss waiver (CDW) or loss damage waiver (LDW). You’ll also see additional CDW/LDW excess reduction options to reduce this to $500, or to zero.

If you hire a car with a CDW or LDW offering a $2,000 excess it means you’ll be liable for a maximum of $2,000 for any damage to the vehicle while rented to you. Take the zero excess option and you will not be liable for any damage to the vehicle.

It’s worth remembering here that “damage” may not just involve a crash – if you lose a key with a transponder for a modern vehicle you could easily face a $300+ bill for replacement. Stone chip damage to a windscreen can easily result in a $500+ bill if a full windscreen replacement is required. Most rental policies will also hold you liable for the excess regardless who is at fault – something that is the exact opposite of personal vehicle insurance which will typically only charge you an excess if you are at fault in an accident.

Another example is listed below from Thrifty Car Rental – in this case the standard excess is $3000 which can be reduced to $500 (confusingly it mentions 300 NZD liability which is obviously an error) for an extra $26 per day, or reduced to $0 for $31 per day.

by Steve Biddle

See Full Story at traveltalk.nz

4 ways to know your insurance clients better

19 April 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Knowing your clients is not only the key to providing them with insurance services and keeping them as clients, it’s also essential to attracting and retaining other clients like them.

Here are some areas to explore so you can get to know your clients better:

Age group

Although I’ve written a lot about understanding millennials, every generation is different: in goals, lifestyles, relationship with money and the way they want to get financial advice.

Accept these differences, and try to find out what clients in all generations are looking for from you.

Challenges in their lives

People face issues with their children, parents, relatives, or past spouses — ranging from medical to financial and anything in between.

Often these issues have a dramatic impact on their lives, and understanding what they are can help you understand your client.

Career tracks

Don’t assume you know where someone’s career is headed — or where he or she wants it to go.

Some people want to end up in the C-suite. Others would be happy doing what they are doing now for the rest of their lives.

Obviously, their financial plans and your financial advice will be based largely on where they want to go — or stay.

Dreams and games

I’m not suggesting you become a life coach, but I believe you should look beyond traditional retirement models to find out what each client really wants — even if they don’t believe it’s possible.

Yes, many people have a hard time acknowledging what they want, but you need to ask to help them reach that goal.

Of course, the best way to understand your clients is to be one of them: Former business executives make the best agents to business executives; former engineers make the best agents to engineers, etc.

If you find yourself with one of these or some other specialized group, and you’re not one of them, the next best thing is to hire an agent who has that background. As I’ve written before, this is a particularly good idea for agencies that recognize the vital importance of attracting millennial clients.

By Angie Herbers

See Full Story at www.propertycasualty360.com

Getting your own authority? Some tips on managing the insurance process

17 April 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Anyone interested in getting into the trucking business under their own authority is often hit with a harsh reality when they try to get insurance. A $10,000 or more bill is common for one year of coverage and in some cases, can even stymie efforts to get into the business.

According to Ashley Hammonds, senior vice president of sales at Reliance Partners, there have been some recent incidents of new venture insurance coming in under $10,000, but generally most policies are in the $10,000 to $15,000 range. There are some instances of the policy approaching $24,000, he says.

So why is new venture insurance so expensive and, more importantly, is it something that every trucking company needs?

The second part of that question is easy. New venture insurance is for those companies with new operating authority, although even someone that has many years of experience could be required to obtain new venture insurance if there has been a break in coverage, i.e., you took 3 years off and came back to trucking.

Like most insurance policies, the first part of that question has many answers. For one, not many companies provide new venture insurance, viewing it as a more significant risk due to the lack of data on the new trucking company.

“New ventures tend to fit in a smaller box,” Hammonds says. “There are fewer companies interested in them. For instance, there may be five markets for new venture insurance but 35 markets for an established company.”

By Brian Straight

See Full Story at www.freightwaves.com

How to assure your spouse gets life-insurance money when you die

12 April 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Here are tips to make sure these problems don’t happen to you.

Temporary coverage during underwriting

Ask for temporary coverage during underwriting so you are protected before the policy kicks in. You may be required to begin paying premiums. The payments are refunded if the policy is not finalized.

Keep notes

Keep notes of all conversations with insurance representatives, no matter how minor, including names and dates. Ask your agent for a copy of statements you made during the application interview. These documents can be useful in contesting a denial.

Ask questions

Ask questions any time you don’t understand something and always answer honestly. Life insurance companies can use the inaccurate or incomplete information to refuse a claim. Even failing to disclose a minor medical condition unrelated to the cause of death can jeopardize your benefits.

List a secondary address

List a secondary address on your policy. If you move or change banks and forget to pay your premium, you have a better chance of receiving the reminders to pay. Most insurance companies cancel policies after 30 to 60 days of missed payments.

Look at guides before buying

Before you buy a policy, check out helpful guides from the American Council of Life Insurers and the National Association of Insurance Commissioners.

By Rebekah L. Sanders

See Full Story at www.azcentral.com

4 Insider Tips to Get the Best Car Insurance Quotes

10 April 2018 By admin Leave a Comment

Shopping for car insurance can be a pain in the neck. There are so many options to choose from, and so many possibilities that it can be daunting to figure out which option is best for you. When it comes to comparing car insurance rates, there are a few things you should know to make the process easier and less intimidating. Let’s look at a few of these tips now, shall we?

Know Who You’re Dealing With

In virtually every case, it’s best to deal with an independent third party when gathering your quotes. This way, you’ll be able to gain unbiased, factual quotes from a variety of insurance companies at once, so you can most accurately compare the quotes to gauge the best deal for you. Compare car insurance from an independent party to get the largest variety of quotes from which to choose.

Know What You’re Looking For

Before you embark on your search for a car insurance quote, it’s important that you fully understand what it is that you are looking for. What kind of coverage do you want? What’s your budget? Knowing what you want and what you can afford to pay before you start looking at quotes will help you to rule out those that don’t meet your needs in one category or the other (coverage versus budget) right out of the gate, which will help to narrow the choices down to those that do meet your needs. That will make choosing the right one for your needs easier.

Go Online

The internet is a great resource for doing research regarding car insurance quotes. You can go to the website of several insurers, enter in some basic information, and gain a quote quickly. This can at least give you a basic idea of the kinds of prices and coverage available, all from the comfort of your home.

Compare Apples to Apples

Before making a choice regarding your car insurance coverage, it’s important to be sure you are comparing apples to apples. In other words, one policy may at first glance seem like the better deal because of the more affordable price, but take a closer look. What does that “affordable” price actually include? It may, in fact, be a better deal to opt for a slightly higher premium that includes more coverage (or the specific type of coverage you need). Don’t let price be your sole guiding principle when it comes to choosing a policy; be aware of what you’re actually getting for your money so you can make an informed decision about what’s best for you.

See Full Story at thenewswheel.com

Insurance Agency Singapore | Commercial Insurance and Personal Insurance