Life Insurance With a Respiratory or Sleep Condition

What Underwriters Look At

Could a breathing or sleep condition change the questions you’re asked when applying?

Having the likely questions mapped out first can let you gather records early and start your application well prepared.

We can map out the questions an insurer may ask about your breathing or sleep condition before you apply.

The decision on cover, and on its terms, rests with the insurer’s underwriter. For asthma and other lung conditions, the questions can reach when symptoms began and last occurred, how often they happen, each medicine, any hospital or emergency visits, days off work and smoking status. For a sleep condition, they can reach your sleep study and treatment. Approaches differ between insurers, so we begin with your own history.

What an insurer may ask about for breathing and sleep:

• Asthma: the dates of your first and most recent symptoms, and how many days a week they occur
• Asthma medicines: any daily preventer, reliever or steroid tablets, and how often each one is used
• Overnight hospital stays or emergency visits for asthma, and any days taken off work because of it
• Work that makes asthma worse or brought it on, and any effect on your usual daily activities
• Breathing tests such as peak flow readings, and any doctors seen for sarcoidosis, bronchiectasis or another lung condition
• Smoking status beside any lung condition, including whether you smoke now and any smoking history
• Sleep apnoea: the severity your sleep study found before and after treatment, and the cause
• Sleep apnoea treatment such as CPAP: how consistently the treatment is used, how well the condition is controlled and any recent review

Life Insurance

If you passed away, how would you like the people closest to you provided for?

Your beneficiaries can receive a life insurance lump sum, giving the people closest to you money to live on.

We’ll set out what a life application asks about your lung or sleep condition, and the records behind each answer.

Life insurance can pay a lump sum if you pass away. With asthma or another lung condition, a life application can look at how well it’s controlled, smoking status and how the condition has changed over time. With sleep apnoea, related factors such as weight can be asked about too. Those details sit alongside the rest of your health, and the insurer makes the decision.

Where your records help with a life application:

• How well controlled your asthma is, set out from GP notes, scripts and any action plan
• Changes in COPD, emphysema or bronchiectasis over time, described from any breathing test results you hold
• Sarcoidosis, with the organs involved and any recent scan or specialist letter
• Related factors an insurer may ask about alongside sleep apnoea, such as weight, diabetes or thyroid conditions
• A past pneumonia, pleurisy or collapsed lung, with the dates and how your recovery went
• Tuberculosis treated in the past, including whether the full course was completed and any lasting lung effects
• Any smoking history alongside COPD or bronchitis, answered with the dates the form asks for
• Childhood asthma on a life application, with when symptoms last appeared and any medication since

Learn more about Life Insurance

TPD Insurance

What would help with the basics if you were never able to work again?

The basics can still be covered by a TPD lump sum if you can’t work again, as the policy defines it.

We can compare TPD definitions with your job, especially where dust, fumes or staying alert are part of it.

TPD insurance pays a lump sum when illness or injury leaves you unlikely to work again under the policy’s definition. Own occupation is measured against your usual job, and any occupation against any job suited to your education, training or experience. For work around dust, fumes or cold air, or work that relies on staying alert, which test applies can matter.

What we weigh with you on TPD:

• Dusty, fume-heavy or cold-air work, and which TPD definition measures your ability to keep doing that work
• Roles that rely on alertness, machinery or driving, and how a sleep condition sits beside them
• A pattern of asthma flare-ups, set out by date for any questions on permanent incapacity
• COPD or bronchiectasis that limits physical work, described by your treating doctor for a TPD application
• Default TPD cover in super after a COPD or sarcoidosis diagnosis, and the definition the fund uses
• A move to lighter or indoor duties because of asthma, and what a TPD definition says about it
• Sleep apnoea alongside night shifts or long rosters, set out clearly with your duties for a TPD application
• A TPD sum insured sized for ongoing medicines, specialist reviews and any equipment such as CPAP

Learn more about TPD Insurance

Income Protection

How could the bills stay paid if illness or injury kept you off work for a while?

Part of your income, paid by income protection after a waiting period, can help cover the bills while you’re away.

We’ll explain how income protection terms could work around flare-ups, sick days or a sleep condition.

Income protection can replace part of your income if illness or injury stops you working, subject to its waiting period, definitions and exclusions. For asthma, a lung condition or sleep apnoea, alternative terms can come back, such as an exclusion for the condition or a higher premium. What an exclusion names sets which claims it affects, and recent days off work can be part of what an insurer asks.

Income protection points we cover with you:

• Days off work for asthma in recent years, set out from any sick leave records you hold
• Asthma brought on or made worse by your job, a question some applications ask by name
• Respiratory exclusion wording, read with you for what it says about chest infections and flare-ups
• Chest infections and short flare-ups, set beside the waiting period you choose and any sick leave
• Long-term COPD or bronchiectasis, with the benefit period weighed against how many working years you have left
• Sleep apnoea and work that relies on staying alert, set out with your duties in the application
• Loadings for a lung or sleep condition, compared side by side with any exclusion offered instead
• Payments after the waiting period ends, subject to the policy’s definitions and exclusions, for a flare-up that keeps you off work

Learn more about Income Protection

Trauma Insurance

Beyond treatment, what other costs might a serious illness bring, and how could they be met?

Trauma insurance can help pay them, for a listed condition that meets the policy’s definition and isn’t excluded.

Together, we’ll go through the lung events on a trauma list and the wording each one carries.

Trauma insurance pays a lump sum if you’re diagnosed with a condition the policy lists and meet its definition. A trauma list can group lung events under organ disorders, such as chronic lung failure on permanent oxygen therapy or the removal of a lung. A condition you already have may be excluded, as far as the exclusion’s wording reaches. New trauma cover can’t be held inside super, which has been the rule for policies written since 1 July 2014.

Trauma wording we check with you:

• Chronic lung failure, which a trauma list can define by a need for permanent oxygen therapy
• Removal of a whole lung, listed on some trauma policies as a separate event under organ disorders
• Asthma, COPD or sarcoidosis named in an exclusion, and how far the exclusion’s wording reaches
• Sleep apnoea history, and whether a trauma offer carries any exclusion tied to it
• Lung definitions compared between policies, because wording can differ from one insurer to the next
• Organ disorder events in the wording you first signed up to, read with you before any switch
• Events unrelated to your lungs on a trauma list, and how a lung exclusion’s wording treats them
• Reports from a respiratory physician, gathered with your consent for a lung failure claim

Learn more about Trauma Insurance

Answering the Health Questions

When the health questions start, how do you know what each one is asking for?

Talking each question through together can make clear what it asks, so your answers can be complete and accurate.

We’ll go through each health question with you, with any scripts, sick days or sleep study to hand.

Since 5 October 2021, the duty when applying for consumer life cover is to take reasonable care not to make a misrepresentation, which means answering the questions asked with reasonable care. If you leave out important details, the insurer may change or cancel your cover or refuse a claim (Moneysmart). With asthma, symptom dates, each medicine and any hospital visit are worth confirming from a GP history, pharmacy record or action plan, not memory.

What we prepare together before anything is lodged:

• The dates of your first and most recent asthma symptoms, taken from GP or pharmacy records rather than memory
• Breathing medicines and how often each is used, checked against a pharmacy record or script history
• Any hospital stay or emergency visit for your breathing, listed with dates from discharge papers
• Breathing or sleep questions open to more than one reading, talked over with us before you answer
• Past pneumonia, bronchitis or a collapsed lung, which a question on any other lung complaint can include
• Sleep study reports and any treatment review, with the dates an application asks for
• Any spirometry or lung function results, with the date of each test and the clinic that did it
• Family history questions about lung disease, answered from what relatives have actually been diagnosed with

Applying With Help

Which steps come first once you’ve decided to apply for cover?

A clear plan of the first steps, set out together, can let you see what each one involves before it starts.

We’ll line up your application with you, from any condition questionnaire to the reports that follow.

Some insurers offer questionnaires for asthma, bronchitis and other respiratory conditions, and for sleep apnoea, which may let an underwriter decide without further medical evidence. Pre-assessment, where offered, gives an indication before a formal application is lodged. Any alternative terms can be talked through with your financial adviser before you accept.

The order we work through with you:

• Asthma and bronchitis questionnaires, where offered, filled in with you from any action plan and script history
• A sleep apnoea questionnaire, where offered, answered with your sleep study report and treatment details to hand
• Asthma or sleep apnoea history put to an insurer for pre-assessment, where offered, ahead of applying
• Letters from any GP, respiratory physician or sleep physician you see, requested with your consent
• Timing after a recent flare-up, hospital stay or new sleep study, where an insurer may defer a decision
• A specialist review already booked, and how an application asks about tests still to come
• Offer letters for a breathing condition, gone through term by term before you say yes
• Smoking questions on the application, answered from the facts whether you smoke, have quit or never have

Cover You May Already Hold

If you hold a policy now, is there anything in it that would be hard to replace?

Comparing your policy with what’s on offer can show anything hard to replace, so you can choose what to keep.

We’ll look over any policy in your name or your super before anything is replaced, cancelled or reduced.

Cover you already hold was issued on its own terms, and the policy wording sets when they can change, so it’s worth reading before you change or replace it. Default cover inside super can usually be issued without medical checks, though it may carry pre-existing condition rules set out in the fund’s PDS, and increasing it is usually underwritten like any other application. A new application asks about your condition as it is today.

What we check in cover you hold:

• Cover arranged before an asthma, COPD or sleep apnoea diagnosis, read for the terms the insurer set at the time
• Chronic lung failure wording in an older trauma policy, set beside how current policies describe it
• Smoker rates on a policy you hold after quitting, and a question to the insurer about reviewing them
• Default cover in super from before a lung diagnosis, and the fund’s pre-existing condition rules
• A request to raise your super cover, where today’s breathing or sleep history goes through the health questions
• Replacing an older policy, where a new application asks about your lung condition as it is now
• An earlier offer with an asthma or sleep exclusion, and the wording that sets how far it reaches
• Leaving a dusty or physical job because of asthma, with any cover tied to that role checked first

Learn more about Life Cover With a Health Condition