Critical illness cover

Yes. Some critical illness policies will cover your children at no extra cost. Others may ask you to pay a little extra to cover them.

Cover for a child works in much the same way as an adult. If your child is injured or develops a serious condition, your policy will pay out. But the amount you’ll receive is usually lower for a child than for yourself, with the maximum being around £25,000. This can still help ease some of the financial burden of having a seriously ill child, giving you some breathing space to focus on what really matters – them.

Both income protection insurance and critical illness cover can help you stay afloat if you’re ill or injured. But they work in very different ways.

Critical illness cover is added to a life insurance policy and pays out a lump sum if you’re diagnosed with a specific illness.

Whereas income protection pays out a percentage of your annual income in the event you’re too ill or injured to work.

Unlike critical illness cover, with income protection there isn’t a specific list of conditions you can claim for. You can typically claim for any illness or injury that prevents you from doing your job.

If you reach the end of your policy term without claiming on your critical illness policy, your coverage will simply end.

However, if you don't make a critical illness cover claim but die while your policy is still active your loved ones can make a claim for your death. 

You can choose how long you would like your critical illness cover policy to last for.

When you buy life insurance with critical illness, you’ll decide on a policy term during the application.

This will be how long your cover lasts for.

For example, this could be 25 years to mirror your mortgage term or it could be 18/21 years to align with when your children might reach financial independence. 

Some insurers may offer critical illness cover to those with pre-existing medical conditions.

Whether you buy a policy will depend on your personal circumstances, such as the type of condition you have and how severe your symptoms are.

If insurers do offer you cover, it’s likely you’ll have exclusions written into your policy for your condition as well as any related conditions.

An exclusion means you won’t be covered for these reasons.

Yes, you can buy joint critical illness cover.

You’ll need to buy a joint life insurance policy and add critical illness to your cover.

This means 2 lives are covered under 1 policy and you'll get 1 payment either if 1 partner is diagnosed with a critical illness or dies during the policy term.

Yes, some insurers offer critical illness cover as a standalone policy.

If you buy critical illness cover on its own, you’ll only be covered in the event of serious illness.

Critical illness cover on its own isn't available through Confused.com, but we can help you find life insurance with critical illness cover.