Financial Planning for Personal Insurance
Life, Income Protection, TPD and Trauma Insurance Advice
Life cover, income protection, TPD and trauma cover each respond to different events, and how they’re held matters too. We help you weigh up the cover that suits your situation and how it fits your wider plan.
Our Financial Advice Team Is Here to Help You
We Can Help You
- Work out how much life cover your household may need
- Consider income protection if illness or injury stops you working
- Consider cover for a mortgage and other debts you hold
- Check what any cover in your super may pay
- Choose between own occupation and any occupation TPD
- Decide whether cover sits inside super or outside it
- Review the cover you already hold
- Check policy ownership and how a payment may be taxed
- Consider cover for a business that depends on key people
- Stand beside you if you ever need to claim
Who We Help
- New parents with someone depending on them for the first time
- First home buyers taking on a mortgage together
- Growing families with school years ahead of them
- Self-employed and contractors with no sick leave to fall back on
- High income earners wanting cover that matches what they earn now
- Business owners protecting partners, staff and what they have built
- Couples through a change a marriage, a separation or a new family
- Tradespeople and manual workers whose income depends on being able to work
- People with cover already wanting to understand what it may pay
What we advise on
The Cover We Can Help You With
Life Insurance Cover
We’ll explain how life cover works and help you work out the amount your household may need.
Life cover generally pays a lump sum if you die or, depending on the policy, are diagnosed with a terminal illness. We consider what the money may need to do, such as clearing debts, replacing income and covering schooling, and take any existing cover, including cover inside super, into account.
Together, we'll work through:
- A sum insured based on your debts, income and how long your household may need support
- Cover held inside super or paid from your own account, and what each choice leaves invested for retirement
- Beneficiary nominations reviewed, including whether each one is binding, still valid, and points where you intend
- How a payment may be taxed, depending on policy ownership and who receives it, checked with your accountant
- Stepped or level premiums, and what each may cost over the period you expect to hold cover
- Cover for a partner who isn’t in paid work, considering the care and household support that may need replacing
- A review of any cover already in place, so you understand what it may pay and how it fits
- The events that should trigger a review: a new mortgage, a child, or a lasting change in income
Income Protection
We can help you consider cover that may replace part of your income if illness or injury stops you working.
Income protection, often called wage cover, can replace part of your income if illness or injury stops you working, up to a limit set by the policy that may reduce after an initial period. The definition, waiting period, benefit period and other requirements all shape what it costs and when it pays.
Together, we'll work out:
- The waiting period before payments can begin, and how a longer wait may affect the premium
- The benefit periods available to you, from a fixed number of years through to a set age
- How your income is assessed at claim time, given new policies are generally written on an indemnity basis
- What an indemnity policy may pay after a period of lower earnings, and how to plan for that
- How much of your income can be covered, and whether the monthly amount reduces after an initial period
- Whether an option to cover super contributions is available and suitable while you’re on claim
- Whether premiums may be tax deductible and how payments are taxed, checked with your accountant
- How cover is structured if you’re self-employed, contracting, or paid largely on commission
Total and Permanent Disability
We’ll explain how TPD cover works and why the definition in your policy matters at claim time.
TPD can pay a lump sum if you meet the policy's definition of total and permanent disability, which may depend on your occupation and work status. The money could help with costs such as home modifications, debt or ongoing care. An own occupation definition is generally easier to meet than an any occupation one.
We'll help you get clear on:
- An own occupation or any occupation definition, and what each would mean for a claim in your role
- Whether any TPD held inside your super fund uses a definition that suits your work
- The activities of daily living definition, which some default cover falls back to, and what it requires
- How TPD and life cover interact when bundled, and whether one benefit reduces the other
- How a TPD payment from super may be taxed at your age, with your accountant’s input
- Whether a benefit is paid as a lump sum or drawn as an income stream, and which suits your plan
- The occupation recorded on the policy, and what to update if your role has changed since it started
- How TPD sits alongside income protection, and the different events each one is designed to cover
Trauma and Critical Illness Cover
We’ll walk you through how trauma cover works and the conditions and requirements your policy sets out.
Trauma cover can pay a lump sum if you’re diagnosed with a listed condition and meet its definition, including any severity or survival requirements, whether or not you stop working. The money could help with treatment, time away from work or a partner reducing their hours.
Together, we'll look at:
- The conditions the policy covers, and the severity, survival period or other requirements for a payment
- A sum insured based on what your household may need, rather than a round figure
- How a trauma payment could help during the waiting period before any income protection payments begin
- Why trauma cover is generally held outside super, and what that means for the premium you pay
- Whether a partial benefit is paid for less severe conditions, and at what proportion of the sum insured
- Whether a reinstatement option is available after a claim, and the conditions attached to it
- Cover for children, and whether it belongs alongside the rest of your protection
- What a trauma payment could help fund in practice, from treatment and recovery to time away from work
Cover Held Inside Super
We can check whether your super fund provides cover, and explain what it may pay and when.
Your super fund may provide default cover, subject to eligibility, with premiums deducted from your super balance rather than your bank account. Cover inside super can be cost-effective, depending on your circumstances, but the amount, definitions and conditions vary, so we check whether it suits your needs on its own.
We'll go through:
- Any cover attached to each fund you hold, including accounts from previous employers
- What each fund’s cover may pay, and how its definitions compare with a policy held outside super
- Premiums deducted from your super balance each year, and the cover they provide
- The occupation rating your fund has applied, and whether it still matches the work you do
- Whether your nomination is binding, and who may receive a payment if one is made
- Which accounts may lose cover through inactivity, and whether electing to keep it suits you
- How a change of employer, rollover or account closure may affect existing cover
- Which cover may be worth keeping inside super, and whether a policy outside it suits you better
Business Expenses Cover
We can help you consider cover for your business’s fixed costs if illness or injury stops you working.
Business expenses cover can help meet eligible fixed costs such as rent, leases, staff wages and utilities if illness or injury keeps you away, subject to the policy terms. It sits alongside income protection: one relates to your personal income, the other to eligible business expenses.
We'll help you work out:
- Fixed costs that continue while you’re unable to work: rent, leases, utilities and staff wages
- Which of those costs a policy may cover, and which are treated as your own drawings
- A monthly amount based on the eligible costs of keeping the business running while you recover
- The benefit period on this cover, which is generally shorter than an income protection benefit period
- How the cover fits alongside any income protection you hold or are considering
- Whether premiums may be deductible to the business and how a payment is taxed, with your accountant
- How a new lease or an additional employee changes the level of cover the business needs
- How long the business could keep trading in your absence, and how cover may support it
Key Person Cover
We can help you protect a business that depends on one or two people.
Key person cover can help offset lost revenue while a replacement is found, fund recruitment or support the business through a difficult period. Some lenders may expect cover where a loan relies on one person, and where an owner has personally secured a loan, that exposure can extend to their household.
Together, we'll sort out:
- Who the business could not quickly replace, and what each of those people contributes to revenue
- The revenue that may be at risk while a replacement is found, based on the business’s own figures
- The cost of a locum, a replacement hire, and any contracts affected during the rebuild
- Whether the cover is for revenue or capital purposes, and the tax treatment to confirm with your accountant
- Who should own the policy, settled and documented before any application is submitted
- What your lender expects where a business loan is secured against an owner personally
- Whether borrowing through the gap may be an option, with lending questions taken to your broker or lender
- The points at which cover should be revisited, as revenue, ownership and roles change
Buy/Sell Agreement Cover
We’ll explain how insurance can help fund the buy-out of a departing owner’s share.
A buy-sell arrangement can help the remaining owners buy out an owner who dies or can't continue, subject to the agreement and policy terms. The agreement still needs funding, so your solicitor prepares the legal document and we advise on insurance that may fund it, with the two reviewed together.
With your solicitor and accountant, we'll work through:
- Events that trigger a buy-out, and the valuation method the agreement applies when one occurs
- Which structure suits the owners: self-ownership, cross-ownership, or an insurance trust
- The sum each owner needs available to buy out the others at the agreed valuation
- How capital gains tax and deductibility may apply under each structure, confirmed with your accountant
- Whether the agreement responds to an owner becoming disabled, and not only to a death
- How the legal agreement and the insurance funding line up, reviewed alongside your solicitor
- The documentation your solicitor prepares alongside the cover being arranged, so both exist
- When to revalue the business, and what the agreement needs updating as ownership shifts
A Review of Cover You Already Hold
We can review the cover you already hold against the situation you’re in now.
A review looks at what each policy may pay, what it excludes and whether the terms still suit your household today. An older policy may carry features that are no longer offered, such as agreed value income protection, so we compare existing and proposed cover before recommending any change.
We'll go through:
- What each policy may pay under its terms, beyond the sum insured on the schedule
- Any exclusions or loadings applied when the policy was underwritten, and whether they still apply
- Whether the premiums are stepped or level, and how costs may change over the next several years
- Older features that may be worth keeping, such as agreed value income protection, no longer offered on new policies
- Whether cover inside super has lapsed or reduced, and what restoring it would involve
- Confirmation that every policy is in force, and that every premium is still being paid
- What a fresh application would ask of you in health and occupation disclosure today
- What restructuring may cost against what it may gain, compared before any existing cover is cancelled
Your Cover, Worked Through Together
How Much Cover You May Need
An amount based on your debts, income and how long your household may need support.
Insurance Inside Your Super
Any cover inside your fund identified, with what it may pay and when.
Who Receives a Payment
Nominations and policy ownership reviewed against who you intend to receive the money.
Policy Definitions Explained
The definitions and conditions that shape how a claim is assessed.
Stepped or Level Premiums
Which may cost less depends on how long you hold the policy and how premiums change.
Exclusions and Loadings
Any exclusions or loadings identified up front, and the options that may be available.
Cover for Business Owners
Key person cover, a funded buy/sell agreement, or cover behind a loan guarantee.
Help at Claim Time
We help you lodge a claim and stay with you while the insurer assesses it.
Proactive, Holistic, and Experienced Financial Planning
Much of financial advice is about building something. This part is about helping protect it. Depending on the cover and its terms, insurance can help meet costs like a mortgage, everyday bills and school fees if something unexpected happens. We’ll help you work out what protection you may need, recommend cover that suits your situation and explain it in plain language before anything is signed. There’s no cost for the initial conversation, and we’ll listen first.
The people you want to protect are often the reason you’re reading about it at all. A partner who could stay in the home. Children whose day to day could stay steadier. A business that could keep going while you recover. We can review your cover with you as things change, and we’ll be there to help if you ever need to make a claim, as well as at application. The insurer assesses each claim, and we can help you through the process.
Every financial decision impacts the next
Your Financial Life Is Connected
Great advice starts with understanding the bigger picture. Every stage of life presents new opportunities and challenges, from buying property and changing careers to growing your family, planning for retirement and protecting what matters most. At Ryker, we help connect every piece of your financial world into one clear strategy.
Your
Wealth
- Property & Investing
- Career & Income
- Tax Strategy
- Insurance & Protecting Your Family
- Super & SMSF
- Wealth & Investments
- Life Events & Changes
- Business & Wealth
- Legacy & Future Wealth
- Retirement Planning
Frequently Asked Questions
We’re invested in your long-term success. What we do is personal, and we take it personally.
Your financial decisions connect, so we consider the parts of your financial life that are relevant to the advice you need:
- Property & Investing
- Career & Income
- Tax Strategy
- Insurance & Protecting Your Family
- Super & SMSF
- Wealth & Investments
- Life Events & Changes
- Business & Wealth
- Legacy & Future Wealth
- Retirement Planning
This is how we help you make decisions today with your longer-term goals in view.
Everybody’s situation is different, so we listen first, understand what matters to you and explain your options clearly before we make a recommendation.
Yes. Insurance advice is a specific service we offer, not an exception we make.
You can get advice on your cover without a full plan across super, investments and retirement. We work out what protection you may need, check any cover you hold inside and outside super, and recommend cover that suits your situation.
If the conversation raises something broader, we’ll let you know, and whether to go further is your call.
No single figure suits everyone, but there is a method. We consider what would need to be paid or replaced:
- Any debt you’d want cleared, such as a mortgage.
- The income your household would lose, and for how long.
- The cost of supporting any children through school and beyond.
- Any lump sum you’d want to leave, including for a business.
We then take into account what you already hold, including any cover inside super, along with savings and other resources. We can work through the calculation with you before recommending an amount.
A comparison website can help you see policies side by side on price and selected features, and that can be a useful starting point.
The features vary, and some details that matter at claim time may need a closer look: how the policy defines disability, whether that definition is own occupation or any occupation, what’s excluded, how the waiting period fits with any sick leave, and what you disclose at application.
We help you work out what protection you may need first, then compare cover that suits your situation.
They’re designed for different events.
- Income protection can replace part of your income while illness or injury stops you working. It’s generally paid monthly until you return to work or the benefit period ends.
- TPD can pay a lump sum if you meet the policy’s definition of total and permanent disability. It can help with costs a monthly payment may not reach, such as clearing debt, modifying a home or funding long-term care.
Some people hold both, because a long illness and a permanent disability are different problems. Which suits you, and at what level, depends on your circumstances and what you’d still need to pay.
Your accountant and financial adviser bring different expertise to the same decisions. Your accountant can advise on tax reporting, structures and consequences; we help you plan how cashflow, debt, super, investments and protection work towards your goals. We can coordinate before important decisions.
What an accountant does
- Prepares and lodges tax returns, BAS and financial statements
- Advises on tax structures such as companies, trusts and partnerships
- Manages bookkeeping, payroll and ATO compliance
- Provides tax advice on the consequences of a transaction
What a financial adviser does
- Sets a long term strategy across retirement, investing and cash flow
- Builds wealth from early in a working life, starting with cash flow, a first home and super
- Recommends specific super funds, investments and personal insurance
- Operates under an Australian Financial Services Licence, which is required to give personal advice on financial products
- Handles retirement planning, Centrelink and aged care strategy, and estate planning considerations
Professional roles and authorisations matter. We provide financial advice within our authorisations and work with your accountant for specialist tax advice and lodgements.
Where they work together
- Tax position. Your accountant confirms your marginal rate, deductions and carried forward losses, which shapes decisions on super contributions, investment structures and the timing of asset sales.
- Business and entity structures. Your accountant advises on the structure itself and your financial adviser works within it for investments, insurance and succession planning.
- Cash flow. Your accountant’s figures can help us understand what’s available for debt repayment, protection and longer-term goals.
- Before key decisions. We can coordinate with your accountant on contributions, asset sales and other material choices in time to consider relevant tax consequences.
It depends on your circumstances, the cover your fund provides and what your household may need.
Cover inside super is often designed for a large group of members, so it may be more or less than you need. It can have limits, the definitions may differ from a policy held outside super, and premiums come out of your super balance rather than your bank account.
It can still be valuable, so it’s worth checking before you switch funds or close an account, because that may end the cover. We’ll explain what yours may pay before you change anything.
You may need less of some cover, and that depends on your circumstances.
Life cover is mainly for people who would be left financially short, so with nobody depending on you it may be a lower priority. Income protection is a different question. You still rely on your own income, and it’s designed to replace part of it if illness or injury stops you working.
A useful question to consider: if your income stopped for a year, what would you live on?
An insurer can explain and offer its own products, and a general insurance broker works mainly with a different class of cover, such as home, car and business insurance. A financial adviser is authorised to recommend a personal insurance strategy for your circumstances and advise on how it fits with your super and wider plan.
That authorisation requires a qualifying degree, a national exam, ongoing training and registration, and it carries a duty to act in your interests.
We can help at application and at claim time, when the policy wording matters.
Certainly. Cover is worth understanding before it’s bought, and we can explain it in plain terms.
There’s no cost for the initial conversation. Tell us whether anyone relies on your income, any cover you hold inside or outside super and what you’d want to happen if you couldn’t work. We’ll explain how we can help and the details we’ll need from you.
The wording of a policy shapes what it pays, so we go through it with you before anything is applied for.
Who We Help
Advice for All Stages of Life
From first job to retirement, we help you build wealth, protect it, and live well.
Starting Out
First jobs, first home, first super, HECS debt, budgeting and more.
Growing Families
First home buyers, new parents, school fees, single incomes, young families and more.
Medical & Health
Doctors, dentists, pharmacists, allied health, nurses and more.
Professional Services & Tech
Lawyers, accountants, brokers, engineers, consultants and more.
Trades & Business Owners
Electricians, plumbers, builders, sole traders, franchisees and more.
Corporate & Executive
Executives, senior managers, directors, board members and more.
Public Sector & Defence
Police, firefighters, paramedics, ADF personnel, teachers and more.
Approaching Retirement
Pre-retirees, transition to retirement, Age Pension, aged care, estate planning and more.
Other Stages
Any income, any stage, career changers, separation, second opinions and more.
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Grow & Protect Your Wealth Today
Whatever’s on your mind, we’re here to help. You’ll speak with an authorised financial adviser who’ll listen first and get to know what matters to you.
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