A self-employed contractor in Lake Nona has a solid health plan and a life insurance policy, and he considers his family protected. Then a back injury keeps him off job sites for seven months. His health plan pays most of the surgery and physical therapy after the deductible. His life insurance pays nothing, because he is alive. The mortgage, the truck payment and the family’s groceries still come due every month, and nothing in his program was built to cover them.
Health insurance, disability insurance and life insurance each answer a different question. Families tend to buy one or two and assume the rest is handled, and the gaps show up in the situations nobody planned for.
What each one protects
Health insurance pays for medical care: doctors, hospitals, prescriptions and treatment. It protects savings from medical bills, but it does not replace income. Disability insurance replaces part of the income lost when illness or injury prevents someone from working. Life insurance pays a lump sum to the family when the insured dies. Each one covers a different event, and none of them substitutes for the others.
The gap in the middle
Disability is the exposure most families leave uncovered, even though a serious illness or injury during working years is more likely than death. Employer plans sometimes include short-term or long-term disability, but self-employed people and business owners usually have nothing unless they buy it. Our article on protecting your income explains how individual disability coverage works.
Long illnesses strain all three
A long illness can touch every part of the program. Health insurance covers treatment after the deductible and out-of-pocket maximum. Disability coverage replaces income while the person cannot work. Some life insurance policies include accelerated death benefits that pay part of the death benefit early for a terminal or chronic illness, and some permanent policies can provide long-term care benefits. Knowing which of these features are on your policies before they are needed makes a difficult time easier.
Business owners carry more of it themselves
Employees often receive health, disability and group life coverage as benefits. Business owners usually provide all three for themselves, and they also carry exposures employees do not: a business that depends on them, partners who would need to buy their share and loans they guaranteed personally. Key person coverage and buy-sell funding address those business needs.
Reviewing them together
Because the three coverages work together, they are worth reviewing together, especially after a job change, the start of a business, a marriage, a new child or retirement. A change in one often affects the others. Leaving a job can end group life and disability coverage along with the health plan, at the same moment.
Worth confirming on your policy
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That your health plan’s deductible and out-of-pocket maximum fit your savings
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That you have disability coverage, especially if you are self-employed
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That your life insurance amount matches your family’s needs
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That you know whether your life policy includes accelerated or long-term care benefits
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That coverage you rely on does not end when you change jobs
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That business owners have looked at key person and buy-sell needs
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That all three are reviewed after major life changes
Talk to us
Prestige Insurance Group offers life insurance and income protection for business owners and families across Florida. For health insurance and Medicare, we work with our partner agency, Tenorio Insurance Inc, led by licensed agent Maira Tenorio, and you can reach them by calling Leandro Villanueva at 305-510-6478. Send us your current policies, and we will show you where the three fit together and where the gaps are.
Call the office nearest you. Se habla español.
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Miami: 305-969-8776
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Orlando: 407-993-2331
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Stuart: 772-247-3788
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Policy features, underwriting and pricing vary by carrier and change over time; review estate, tax and business planning with your attorney or accountant. Prestige Insurance Group, Florida agency license L057894.
