Underwriting

With our underwriting, we give you the best of both worlds:

  • The world’s no.1 underwriting engine, with instant decisions 66% of the time.
  • Underwriters you can call, anytime you want to discuss a case.

How are we different?

Click on one of our icons below to find out more.

Mental Health

Type 2 Diabetes

Working at heights

Higher BMI

Hazardous pursuits

ADHD and Autism

HIV

Price discounts

Oil rigs

Mental Health

We’ll usually insure people who’ve had mental health issues if they manage them well, or if they’ve recovered. For people who’ve gone through relationship problems or bereavement, we can often do this with no exclusions and without increasing their price. As long as it wasn’t too recent, and they no longer need treatment.

We also take an understanding approach to people who’ve attempted to take their own life in the past, as we know time heals and circumstances change. We’ll speak with your client to understand their situation and how things have changed, and we’ll offer cover where we can.

Type 2 Diabetes

We’re often able to insure people with type 2 diabetes.
Because it can be a complex condition, we’ll contact your client directly to find out more about their compliance and control of the condition. We look at each person’s unique circumstances and we’ll do the best we can for them. We can sometimes cover them for issues they might get from their diabetes. Their price may increase because of their condition.

Working at heights

We can usually insure people working above 40ft.
Common examples include roofers, or tree surgeons. We try to cover as many jobs as we can, though from time to time we do come across heights that are too high-risk for us to cover.

Higher Body Mass Index (BMI)

We’ll insure people with a Body Mass Index of up to 40, with no age restrictions.
Depending on the person, sometimes we might need to increase their price, or the time they’d need to wait between becoming too unwell to work and when we pay out.

Hazardous pursuits

We aim to be generous when it comes to hazardous pursuits and can often insure people against accidents from those pastimes.
Examples of hobbies we’re able to cover include motocross, mountain biking, horse-riding, climbing and diving, but there are many more.
Sometimes we can even cover these at competition-level, though it’s not always possible. And sometimes we may need to limit how long we can pay Sick Pay out for, to 1 or 2 years for each claim.

ADHD and Autism

More people are referring themselves for assessments to see if they have conditions like ADHD or Autism. They do this as they want to understand more about what they consider to be their ‘quirks’. The waiting list to be assessed is 2 years long and we think it’s unfair not to consider cover whilst they’re waiting for their assessment.

Our Underwriters will contact your client directly to chat about their individual circumstances and look to offer them cover where we can.

HIV

If you’ve got a client with Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) we may be able to insure them. Our Underwriters will speak with them to understand their individual circumstances. We’ll need to see copies of test results, medication and any reports your client has from their HIV specialist.
This is usually enough for us to be able to insure them, but if not we may need to get a GP report. Their insurance will usually be 50% to 75% higher than our normal price.

Price discounts

Mental illness and back conditions are the most common causes of claims. So, if we find we’re not able to cover these, we’ll reduce your client’s price.
Currently we’re reducing prices by 10% for each of these areas if they’re excluded.

Oil rigs jobs

Advisers told us about their frustrations trying to get cover for clients who work on oil rigs. They asked if we could take a fresh look at the challenges and risks that make them hard to insure. Our Underwriters listened and got to work on it… and we can now offer My Sick Pay to clients in a whole range of different oil rig jobs!

The jobs on oil rigs that we can now cover are:
– Engineer
– Floorman
– Foreman
– Mechanic & Rig Mechanic
– Rig Electrician
– Surveyor
– Valveman.

We also give you

If for any reason, you think we’ve made an unfair decision, you can challenge us.

If you’ve got some more information about your client, we’d be happy to talk with you about it, and see if it makes a difference. We can’t guarantee to change our decision, but we do guarantee we’ll listen and be fair and reasonable.

One frustration during Underwriting is the need for a GP report which can slow everything down.

The great news is that we have no automatic medical limits. So, we only get additional information based on what your client tells us about themselves.

Having said that, if we do need to get a GP report for another reason, we use a company that averages 12 days to get the GP report back to us. So, no more waiting for months on end.

Our Underwriting team are always looking to find ways to improve the service they offer you and your clients. So, they’ve come up with a list of promises around how they’ll do this, on top of everything else we’ve covered. Here they are!

  • We’ll keep you informed about your clients application, every step of the way.
  • We’ll help you with applications where you need it. That could be us collecting all your client’s application information, and taking responsibility for disclosure, through a tele interview.
  • We’ll always call your client to gain medical information we need, and only contact a medical professional if it’s absolutely necessary.
  • If we decide to offer non-standard cover or we decline or postpone cover, we’ll call your client to explain the exact reasons why.
  • We’ll offer your client a choice of an exclusion or rating where possible.
  • If you’ve got better terms elsewhere, tell us, we’ll review ours to see if we can match them.
  • We’re happy to review and potentially remove an exclusion we’ve applied, if your client provides us with the information we need to do this in the future.
  • If you disagree with our underwriting decision, you can call us and challenge it. We’ll listen with an open mind.

Download our Underwriting guide

Underwriting Guide

We’re here to help

If you can’t find what you need in our underwriting guide, or you need an update, you can call our friendly team.

Pre-sales Underwriting

To ask how a client’s medical history or lifestyle would affect their application.

Call us on 01452 782 760 – option 2

Or email us [email protected]

Underwriting Support

If you want an update on an application that’s not gone live yet.

Call us on 01452 782 760 – option 1

Or email us [email protected]