What is Survival Period In Health Insurances?
Updated On Apr 12, 2024
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The Survival period is an important aspect of a critical insurance policy. It refers to the time the policyholder must survive after being diagnosed with a critical illness. When a person is diagnosed with a critical illness, their health insurance company would pay a lump sum under the critical illness insurance policy to help cover medical expenses incurred in treating the illness.
Insurers will pose a high liability if they agree to pay as soon as the policyholder is diagnosed with a critical illness. Therefore, the survival period is an important clause for insurance companies, and they will pay the coverage amount only if the policyholder survives the period. The survival period varies from 14 days to a month, and this can vary from insurer to insurer according to the insurance plan
How is the Survival Period Different from the Waiting Period?
While the survival period is a duration that one must survive after being diagnosed with a critical illness, a waiting period is a time, when one has to wait out to raise an insurance claim. Every health insurance policy will have a waiting period that policyholders must complete but, a survival period is mostly specific to critical illness insurance. While survival periods can vary from 2 weeks to a month, waiting periods can range from 15 days to 4 years depending on the policy
Know About Survival Period Before Buying Health Insurance Policy
The survival period is a way for insurers to delay the process of paying the insured sum. The longer the survival period, the longer the policyholder would have to wait for the claim amount, the shorter the claim amount, the faster one can obtain the coverage amount. This way the financial burden will be reduced easily. Thus, carefully choosing critical illness insurance with the shortest survival period is advisable
Return on Premium
Return on premium refers to the refund of the total premium paid by the policyholder before their untimely death. Most critical illness plans do not offer the return on premium option if the policyholder dies during the survival period. Some insurers provide a return on premium to the nominee or family members
Conclusion
The survival period is a very important aspect of a critical health insurance policy, and one must understand the difference between the waiting period and the survival period. Remember that the shorter the duration, the faster the coverage amount will be paid. Make sure that you do proper research about health insurance policies before settling to buy one.
Also read: What Is Floater Cover In Health Insurance
