What challenges face advisers when talking to clients about protection?
The biggest challenge is the pre-conceptions many people have: that misfortune won't happen to them, that protection is expensive, and that it won't pay out. There's also a lack of understanding of what each type of cover provides with many people not clear about the differences between, for example, income protection and critical illness cover. Protection is also often spoken about as part of the advice process for another product such as a mortgage. It can therefore be a challenge to get across the importance of protection as part of what may already be a lengthy process.
How can menu plans help?
Most clients have a number of needs but a limited budget. A menu plan can be tailored to both the client's needs and budget and can be cheaper overall than multiple policies.
Such plans allow advisers to provide some cover for all of those needs without having to complete multiple applications and without the client having to keep track of multiple policies with different providers. And by providing a breadth of cover - increasing the chance of a claim rather than maximising the claim amount for one type of cover - you can make sure a client isn't left asking ‘Why did my adviser not tell me about this?' when something happens to them that wouldn't otherwise have been covered.
How is Royal London helping advisers have better conversations about protection?
We recognise there is more to recommending protection than just the product and the price. That is why we provide a series of tools to help advisers with the conversation with their clients and ensure that their policies are set up in the right way to achieve their desired outcome.
Our new menu tool is part of this effort. Sitting as part of our pre-sales protection tool suite, this new tool highlights where broader menu propositions could offer customers more chances of claiming than a traditional life or critical illness sale. Advisers can input some basic information about their client and get a series of indicative quotes showing how a menu plan could be put together in various ways.
The new menu tool draws a direct comparison to the cost and chances of a claim being made on a simple life or critical illness cover plan against a combination of separate life cover, critical illness cover and income protection at various levels and including different options. This gives the adviser an easy way to introduce the idea of other types of cover the client may not be aware of, or might have thought they couldn't afford, before moving on to obtain a more tailored quote, depending on the client's needs and priorities.
Click here to explore tips from leading advisers on improving protection conversations - and to learn more about Royal London's new menu tool.
The Royal London Mutual Insurance Society Limited is authorised by the Prudential Regulation Authority and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. The firm is on the Financial Services Register, registration number 117672. It provides life assurance and pensions. Registered in England and Wales number 99064. Registered office: 55 Gracechurch Street, London, EC3V 0RL. Royal London Marketing Limited is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and introduces Royal London's customers to other insurance companies. The firm is on the Financial Services Register, registration number 302391. Registered in England and Wales number 4414137. Registered office: 55 Gracechurch Street, London, EC3V 0RL.
