A total of £1.2bn worth of group risk claims were paid out during 2012, helping over 23,000 UK families to avoid financial distress, research finds.
The data compiled by Group Risk Development (Grid) showed a significant increase in claims paid out for group life and group income protection benefits with an extra £74.6m and £8.2m paid out respectively over the previous year. Group critical illness claims remained in line with previous years.
Speaking to WSB, Grid spokeswoman Katharine Moxham explained that while group critical illness was still fairly young, take-up among employers and their staff was growing steadily.
"It's [group critical illness] a relatively young benefit and hasn't reached the same sort of levels as the others and that's why that looks quite small in comparison. Critical illness is growing, it's a very popular flex benefit and very well perceived. Our latest employer research indicated that staff demand was among their top three reasons for actually offering group critical illness," she said.
Almost half (44%) of group life claims were attributed to cancer, with 15% caused by ischaemic heart disease, while mental illness (21%) and musculoskeletal (21%) were the highest claims for group income protection. Claims associated with cancer (69%) were also the highest for group critical illness, while 10% were attributed to heart attacks.
Moxham added: "It's important to recognise that employers are not obliged to provide any of these benefits and those that do therefore make a sizeable contribution towards protecting the UK population against the financial consequences of death or prolonged disability.
"They are a much valued benefit not only to employees but also the government as they take the burden off the state and help reduce welfare benefit payments," she concluded.
