Organizations
Life Insurance vs. Personal Accident
What’s Best When Your Employees Are Abroad?
Today, organizations are more global than ever before, and it’s important that those working abroad are protected. Despite the best precautions, accidents can still happen, and workers can be put at risk.
That’s why Clements Worldwide offers global companies customizable group life insurance and group personal accident insurance, which can both protect the company and employee, and alleviate any possible financial strain.
What is the difference between life insurance and personal accident insurance?
Abdallah Ahmed, from Clements Worldwide, said when looking at the two policies, there are several things a company needs to consider as to which works best for them.
“Life insurance can cover natural causes as well as accidents, while a personal accident policy will be much more tailor-made for some of the more high-risk places,” he said. “A personal accident policy offers more than just death benefits, including salary compensation if an employee can’t work, benefits for serious accidents like dismemberment, and access to emergency evacuation.”
Because illness is still more likely to be the cause of death or inability to work, a personal accident policy is usually more affordable than a life insurance policy for expatriate staff. It will also be offered in high-risk locations where life insurance may not be available.
With a personal accident policy, one of the biggest benefits is that it protects against partial and temporary disabilities, meaning there are benefits in place for someone who cannot perform their work any longer.
Should you offer both policies to employees?
Many companies will choose to offer both policies, because they want to offer a life benefit for illnesses and all the components of a personal accident policy. With a life policy employers can also offer a base coverage amount, like 1X the employee salary, and allow employees to increase their coverage as a voluntary benefit and pay the difference in premium.
“On a life insurance policy, you want to make sure the policy covers “death all causes”, meaning illness or accident,” Ahmed said. “In today’s geopolitical climate you want to ensure that terrorism or political violence is included as a cause of death. This is equally true for a personal accident policy.”
Additionally when looking at a life insurance policy, a global company needs to ensure the policy has world-wide jurisdiction. For example, if someone dies in Tanzania and it was a policy written in the U.S., a company must confirm the policy is not going to exclude this part of the world.
Will you need to evacuate?
While Clements Worldwide offers several insurance solutions to help companies prepare for potential evacuations, a personal accident policy can include that, as well.
“Some of the organizations are operating in parts of the world where they are asking to have political security evacuation added on to the policy,” Ahmed said. “It’s not a personal accident but it’s a situation that could potentially require an evacuation from the country.” The evacuation component can cover exposure to tropical illnesses like Ebola, political security risk and natural disasters, which could limit operations and pose health risks to employees.
“If there’s a deterioration of a political situation in a country, people can be evacuated, or if there’s a natural disaster and you need access to crisis responders to move staff to safe location, that’s something that you can potentially have access to,” Ahmed said.
While other insurance companies have evacuation policies, many limit the service providers who will conduct the evacuation. Clements Worldwide partners with Antenna Global, a crisis responder broker who will access the closest available team to get your employees out expeditiously.
“We are the right company for this because we’ve been doing it since 1947, supporting clients operating in the most high-risk parts of the world,” Ahmed said. “We have clients in Syria, Somalia and other locations around the globe that organizations would be most concerned about.”
Clements Worldwide policies are backed by Lloyds of London, the largest insurance market place on the globe, so your company can feel safe knowing you’re in reliable hands.
“We have preferential rates as well given our specialization in the area and our scale in this program,” Ahmed said. “You’re not only getting the best program available, but the best rates as well.”
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